A Supercharged Retreat
by RainStorm14
Summary: Thanks to the senseis, Kaos has once again been captured. But now that everything has settled down, Spitfire feels like his team of superchargers has drifted apart. In attempt to reunite the team, he organises a retreat, but things might not go as planned with Nightshade on the loose.
1. Chapter 1, To Fuel the Fire

**Before I get on with the story, I'd like to give you an idea of what to expect in this story (no spoilers, don't worry). If you don't really care, go ahead and skip this. It's nothing too important.**

 **First, I personally hate it when someone completely ruins one of my favorite characters, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. I don't mind playing with the character's emotions and personality a little bit, but it still needs to be the same character. Therefor I'm keeping them as close to Activision's original intent and the mass view of the character. Unfortunately, everyone has different views, so PLEASE tell me if you feel like I'm getting a character wrong. I have read all their backstories, books, and so on, in case you were wondering. Multiple times.**

 **Second, this is not a love story. Actually, love is to general, so let's go with "this is not a romance story". That's better. This will not include fan paired relationships such as Spyro and Cynder or Stealth Elf and Flameslinger. However, relationships such as Bash and Flashwing may be mentioned.**

 **Third, I wont be making up characters such as humans and putting them in the story. I restrain from making up characters in general, unless necessary. It's a story about the skylanders, not some random person.**

 **I won't be including Bowser or DK in this. It's partly because it takes place after Imaginators and partly to simplify things.**

 **Also, there will be no lasting effects, meaning that I won't create permanent grudges, injuries, and escaped villains will end up in the same place that they were when I started this story. This way you can pretend it actually happened because it won't conflict with the actual skylanders games.**

 **While it'll look like Spitfire is the main character in the first chapter, there is no "main character" in this. It's about ALL the superchargers (not including our Nintindo friends). I'll probably favor some characters more than others because it can be challenging to work with 18. TELL ME if you feel like a character is being neglected.**

 **And lastly, enjoy.**

 **Ps: I know this was a little *cough* a lot *cough* longer than intended. Sorry about that.**

* * *

Spitfire was bored. He'd been bored since Kaos's last capture. There were still skirmishes here and there, Terrafin and Trigger Happy where dealing with one now. But it wasn't the same. There weren't any "calls to adventure" that required him to assemble a group and do something. That's what he really missed. His team. He still saw them all of course, and occasionally go on a drive with one or two, but they were never truly back together. It felt as if the superchargers team had just drifted apart.

Usually when he was this bored, Spitfire would come up with some nearly impossible challenge for Stormblade to try out, but she was off on a mission with Stealth Elf and Roller Brawl. The purple bird had also been feeling completely bored lately, so when the elf and vampier decided to team up on their personal missions, Stormblade practically begged them to let her tag along. He knew that Dive Clops was spending time catching up with his brother, Eye Brawl. Pop Fizz was undoubtably back in is chemistry lab.

Spitfire's thoughts were interrupted as he noticed a short mabu with a green jacket and book-filled backpack walk by.

"Hey, Hugo," Spitfire called out to the Mabu.

"Hmm? Oh, hi Spitfire. What can I do for you?" The mabu rubbed his eye under his glasses.

"I was wondering if you've seen Nightfall anywhere?" Spitfire asked.

"Hmmm, let he think." Hugo rubbed his eye again, and Spitfire wondered if the overloaded mabu got much sleep. Or maybe he was just allergic to sheep dander. "Thats right," Hugo said. "I saw her and Camo heading down to the beach not long ago. You might try there."

"Thanks Hugo." Following Hugo's advice, the flame spirit headed down to the beach.

Nightfall was there alright, along with an unfortunate Spyro and sniggering Camo.

"Seriously?" Spitfire pointed to Spyro snoozing in the shade of a tree. The purple dragon's horns were covered in pink glitter paint and the tips adorned with clown noses. Glued to his face was a pair of bushy eyebrows and mustache.

"It was Camo's idea," Nightfall said defensively.

"You helped fair and square," Camo said. The lively life dragon then bounded off, no longer able to control his laughter.

"I figured he'd explode like one of his pumpkins sooner or later," Nightfall said.

"So I take it you've been pretty bored also?" Spitfire asked her.

Nightfall sat down on a rock. "Yeah, it's been pretty dull lately. I thought about taking the Sea Shadow out to explore some, but…" she trailed off and threw a rock into the water.

"To lonely?" Spitfire guessed.

She nodded. "Back in Fogshadow, I didn't really have much in the way of friends, so exploring the ocean caverns was a relief from my dull life." She tossed another stone.

"I know how you feel," he said.

"Urg," Nightfall tossed her next rock a little harder. "Why can't Kaos just break loos again or something!"

"Literally of figuratively?" Spitfire asked.

She shrugged. "Both I guess." She tossed another rock. "Hey, I heard that Flynn challenged the boys to a race. Again. Wanna go see?" she asked, getting up.

Lately Flynn had been challenging Astroblast, Jet Vac, and Thrillipede to friendly air races to prove who was the best pilot in skylands. "Not really," he said. "You know what's gonna happen. One of the superchargers is gonna win and Flynn will come in last. Then Flynn is going to "admit" that he let them win. Everyone will roll their eyes and think "yeah right". Than, a few days later, Flynn will propose another challenge."

"Yeah, your right. That pretty much sums it up," Nightfall agreed. She heard the soft, familiar beat of a chopper's blades in the distance. "Sounds like the girls are back," she said, pointing at the distant shapes of the Sky Slicer and Stealth Stinger.

"Let's go see if they found anything interesting," Spitfire agreed.

* * *

"Well, that was pointless," Stealth Elf said as she hopped out of the Stealth Stinger.

"So, I take it that you didn't learn anything then?" Nightfall asked as she and Spitfire walked up to the parking vehicles.

"Nope," Roller Brawl said as she climbed out of her Tomb Buggy.

"We did to!" Stormblade said, ever the enthusiast. "We learned that not only are goliath drow dumb, but their totally flammable too."

Roller Brawl sniggered. "That wasn't even our fault."

"Well, at least you got to do something today," Spitfire offered.

"Yeah, but still, we didn't get anywhere," Stealth Elf said. "Any news on the Nightshade problem?"

"No, I'd completely forgotten about that," Spitfire said. A few months ago, the infamous dark thief known as Nightshade had escaped his traptainium cell. The entire tap team has been on high alert, but it was like the cat had simply vanished. Nothing had been stolen, and no one has seen a trace of him. Some believed that he was tired of being caught, so he decided to hide in the shadows for a wile. Spitfire didn't buy it, and neither did Stealth Elf.

"Probably means there's no news to be heard," she said

"Probably," Spitfire agreed. He got an Idea. "Well, I'll see you all around soon."

"Where're you going?" Stormblade asked.

"I've got something I need to ask Eon," he answered simply.

As he drew closer to the Academy, Spitfire's speed increased. Why hadn't he thought of this before?! He drew to the steps and entered. He found Eon's spirit in the library, though it took an agonizingly long time to do so.

"Spitfire!" Eon exclaimed. He beckoned the flame spirit in. "Something troubling you?"

Spitfire took a seat on the couch closest to Master Eon. "It's my team," he said. "Ever since things quieted down, Ive felt like they've been drifting apart."

"Ah yes," Eon said knowingly. "That happens from time to time. Oddly enough, more often in times of piece than times of conflict."

"I was hoping to get permission to bring the team back together with some sort of event, like a retreat," Spitfire continued.

"A retreat." Eon was thoughtful for a moment. "Yes, I do think that would be beneficial for your team. And yours isn't the only team that could a retreat to be honest. Some of the swappers have been at each other's thoughts lately. Literally in Night Shift's case."

"So, do I have your permission?" Spitfire inquired.

"Yes, you do, Spitfire. Just the eighteen of you?"

"Just the eighteen," he confirmed."

"Very well. I will alert Hugo to make preparations."

"Thank you Master Eon."

"It"s my pleasure, Spitfire. I'm glad to see you take so much care in your team."

Spitfire bowed his head to the old portal master and went to deliver the news.


	2. Chapter 2, Road trip

"A retreat?" Stormblade said. "I don't think anyone's ever done that before. At least not with a group this large."

For the first time in months, Spitfire had succeeded in bringing all eighteen members of the skylanders supercharged team to the same place. Some had been easy to find, others they had to wait on as they came back from whatever they were doing. A few he had to refind after they got bored and ran off. Namely Trigger Happy and Pop Fizz. But finally he managed to get them all into the academy's library. Most of them had settled onto the couches, but he prefered to stand.

"Eon said it was a good idea," Spitfire pressed on. He looked at the faces around him, searching for support. High Volt, Jet vac, and Thrillipede were all in deep thought. They were the ones that usually thought things through a bit more carefully. Trigger Happy, on the other hand, looked as if he were ready to jump in the Gold Rusher right then and go. He was jumping up and down in his excitement. It was as if he'd eaten batteries for breakfast. Maybe he did, Spitfire had never really asked. He had absolutely no idea as to how Dive Clops felt about the retreat idea. No one could ever read him, as he was an eyeball in a diving suit. The majority of the team, however, seemed at least interested as far as he could tell. Nightfall was the only one who looked a little doubtful.

"I'm all for it!" Stormblade declared. She was tired of sitting around anyway, and the Sky Slicer could only take so much polishing. If there was a chance to do something new, she would take it.

Spitfire smiled at her, grateful for the support. Stormblade was someone he could always count on to back him up.

"I think I agree on this one," Jet vac said. "The team has been coming up a little short lately, as you said Spitfire. We could all use the extra training." The sky barron was one of oldest and most experienced skylanders on the team, so his approval raised the the others optimism.

"I agree as well," Fiesta said. "We can treat like one big supercharged party!"

"A party that involves lots of hard core training," Nightfall reminded him.

"We can have fun while training. That is the whole point, isn't it, amigo?" he asked Spitfire.

Spitfire nodded. "Yup. Training, team building, and just having fun pretty much sums it up. Hugo's found a great location in a remote area off to the west. There's a barracks and a half already built there. Apparently there's several places across Skylands with emergency hideouts. What's nice about this one is that there's a huge lake nearby, perfect for the water vehicles."

"Barracks and a half? What's that supposed to mean?" Terrafin asked.

"It means that after the original barracks was built, it was decided that it wouldn't be enough space, so they built a smaller one next to it," Spitfire explained.

" Huh, convenient," Splat said.

"So, how long is this retreat supposed to be?" Nightfall asked.

"Four weeks," Spitfire said.

"Four weeks?!"

"Four weeks aint so bad," Smash hit said. "Well, unless you meant "four weeks" like four weak members, that would be bad, and all the more reason to spend four more weeks training! I'm in!"

"Right," Spitfire said. He wasn't sure how else he was supposed to respond to that.

"Come on Nightfall, what else are you going to do in the next four weeks?" Stormblade asked her.

"Now that you mention it... the retreat does sounds pretty good."

"Glad to hear it, because you don't actually have a choice," Spitfire told her.

"Wait, than why'd you even ask in the first place?" said Stormblade.

"If you were all opposed to the idea, then I would've just candled it, but since Nightfall's the only stick-in-the-mud, were doing it." He got a very stern glare from Nightfall, a reminder that he was glad they were on the same team.

"Then what are we waiting for? Let's go pack!" Pop Fizz declared. The team started to break.

"Hold on," Stealth Elf interjected. "What about Nightshade? He's still on the loose."

"That's a job for the trap team, Stealth Elf. And even so, there's still a couple hundred skylanders here at the academy ready to fight. They can handle things without us for a little while. We even have a radio station in case they need to contact us, or vice versa," Spitfire told her.

Stealth Elf knew he was right, but she still didn't like the idea of being away from the action. She often felt like the other skylanders weren't as cautious as the should be. "All right," she said. "As long as we aren't cut off from the academy."

"Now can we go?" Pop Fizz asked. He was nearly as eager as Trigger Happy.

* * *

The next morning, all the superchargers were packed, loaded, and ready to go.

"Um, Pop Fizz, did you pack your entire lab?" Astroblast asked the blue gremlin. He looked up at the bulging sack on top of the Soda Skimmer. The weight of it pressed the watercraft low in the waves, threatening to flood over. And _he'd_ thought he'd over packed.

"No," Pop Fizz answered. "Just most of it. You never know what you might end up needing, so it's better just to bring as much as you can."

"Right. So, uh, where do you plan to put all that? I mean, it's already going to be crowded as it is," Astroblast said.

"I don't know. I guess we'll see when we get there," he answered casually.

"Alright team, let's move out!" Spitfire called to the waiting superchargers. He took the lead with his Hot Streak, heading west across the island. Seventeen vehicles followed close on his heels, whether in the air, on the ground, or through water channels.

The group progressed across the many floating island that made up skylands over the next few hours. They wove through them at high speed, only stopping once when Spitfire released he had read part of the map wrong. Occasionally the water superchargers had to split away from the group and follow a different route, but for the most part they managed to stick together.

After a while, some of the superchargers got bored and started performing tricks while still keeping up with the group. Astroblast shot through trees and high buildings at full speed. He narrowly avoided taking a chip off the old block in one attempt. Splat managed to repaint several sings with perfect accuracy as she drove along the rivers. Trigger Happy performed a wide variety of tricks, most of them involving a golden explosion. Unfortunately, Spitfire had to put an end to all the fun after Smash Hit accidentally drove the Thump Truck through a few shops. Ok, so many it wasn't entirely an accident. Wrecking havoc was just in his blood.

It was past noon when they pulled over again for Eruptor, who apparently got car sick after hours of driving.

"Leave it to Eruptor to be the only supercharger who gets car sick," Stealth Elf muttered.

"Right-o!" Smash Hit agreed. "Or would it be motorcycle sickness since, ya know, he technically drives a motorcycle, not a car?"

"Yeah, sure," Stealth Elf said.

High Volt walked over to Spitfire. "Sir, How much further until we reach our destination, sir?"

"Not much further, High Volt. We've got to go through three more islands south," he pointed to demonstrate, " And the a big leap west, and we're there."

"If you didn't read the map wrong again," Stormblade teased.

"Hey, it's not my fault Hugo's handwriting is so tiny."

"We're good!" Eruptor announced as he walked back over to the group. He climbed back onto the Burn Cycle.

It turned out that Spitfire had read the map correctly this time because they reached their destination in just under fifteen minutes. A large portion of the island was taken up by a lake, just as Hugo promised. An equally large portion was taken up by a lush forest, leaving the rest of the island pretty open. There were two buildings at the edge of the fields near the forest. One was noticeably larger than the other. a short distance from the two cabins as a training area, consisting of an arena, shed, and obstacle course yet to be set up. Closer to the forest was a small fire ring, waiting for use.

"And we're here," Spitfire said, parking the Hot streak near the two cabins. "Boys in the big barracks, girls in the small one."

"They look more like cabins than a barracks," Stormblade remarked.

"So, for the rest the evening just get settled. We can meet up again for dinner at the fire ring," Spitfire said.

Most of the skylanders started to unload their luggage from their vehicles, but Stormblade headed straight for her cabin. Unpacking could wait, she wanted to explore! From the outside, the cabin didn't look like anything special. The design was simple; a box made out of wood with a couple windows and a door. Hopefully it would be more interesting from the inside than it was from the outside. Hopefully.

Stormblade was disappointed. From where she stood at the doorway, she examined the room. This was evidently the sleeping area, as there were five beds in a row to the right, along with a window. Oddly, the window wasn't centered, but closer to the door. To the right, and this time fairly centered, were two doors. Stormblade walked over to the and opened the first one. It lead into a small square sitting area with a couple of couches and a small writing desk. At the far end of the sitting room was another door, which proved to be the bathroom.

She proceeded to the second door. This one led to as small kitchen that consisted of a fridge, pantry, small oven, microwave, and a counter with an electric mixing bowl. The drawers and cabinets contained all the other basic cooking materials, such as knives and cutting boards. She took a peek inside the fridge. They had all been informed by Hugo that the food supplies and already been taken care of by someone who had traveled by portal. She was curious to know what they had.

Inside she found what anyone would expect to find in a fridge; milk, jelly, sandwich meat, a drawer of fruit, and so on. But she also found what you wouldn't find in a typical fridge. There was a little basket filled with small dark fruit that Stormblade had never seen before. There was a note on it that said WARNING: Only Nightfall may eat. She was so gonna question the dreadwalker about that later. There was also a sort of exotic salad that she swore she could see grass in. Finally there were a few bottles of a dark red substance. The note on these said WARNING: This is NOT koolaid. Stormblade closed the fridge door and decided to tell herself that it was just koolaid.

When Stormblade reentered the sleeping area, she found Splat in the doorway carefully inspecting the plain brown walls. "Well this place is drab," the faun decided.

"No kidding, right?" Stormblade said. "I mean, it's like there wasn't any effort put into this place at all. The window isn't even centered."

"Actually, I think that's to accommodate the different element types," Splat said.

"Oh. That does make more sense." Stormblade now noticed the difference in lighting from one end of the room to the other.

There was a loud explosion from outside.

"What in the—" Stormblade was cut off as the other three girls hurried inside. Stealth Elf quickly closed the door behind her and latched it.

"Well that was close," she said.

"What? What was close? What happened?" Stormblade asked.

"I'm not entirely sure," Stealth Elf said. "But from what I could tell, there was an explosion over near the water vehicles. Pop and some of the other guys started to yell at each other, so we took it as our cue to leave. I'd rather not get dragged into another squabble, not until we're at least settled."

Arguing could be heard from outside, but it was muffled by the cabin walls.

"Five bucks betting that it was Eruptor barfing on one of Pop's potions," Roller Brawl offered.

"Your on!" Stormblade said.

Nightfall moved further into the room. "I call the end bed," she said.

"And why should you get the darkest spot?" Roller Brawl protested.

"Because I'm of the dark element," she argued.

"Undead's pretty close."

Nightfall started to say something else, but Stormblade cut in. "How about you each give a reason why you should get the dark end," she suggested. "Then Stealth Elf, Splat, and I will decide who has the better reason,"

Roller Brawl shrugged. "Sounds fair." Despite the bone helmet covering her mouth, it was obvious she was smiling at idea of competition. Unlike most undead skylanders, Roller brawl kept up a lively attitude and playful spirit. She preferred to leave the the foreboding aura and dead seriousness to skylanders like Hex and Chop Chop.

"Like I said, I'm of the dark element," Nightfall said as if that should be reason enough. "Also, I called it first."

"My skin burns in sunlight," Roller Brawl said casually. That got her some very confused looks.

"Um, we were just outside and I don't remember any burring flesh," Stormblade said.

"Yeah, I have to take this pill every morning to reverse the effects. It acts like some sort of super-powered sunscreen. Several creatures from the underworld have to take it in order to come to the surface," she explained.

"Oh. I've actually heard of that myth once, but I didn't think much of it," Stealth Elf said. "I mean, about vampires burning in sunlight, not the immunity pill."

"Unfortunately it's not a myth. Lets just say I've had a few rude awakenings when I forgot to turn my alarm on"

"Sorry, Nightfall, but I think Roller Brawl's got you beat on this one," Stormblade said. She looked at Stealth Elf, who nodded in agreement. Splat nodded absently, only half paying attention to what was going on. She was still carefully examining the room, like it was a canvass she was sizing up before painting.

"Tell you what, Nightfall, I think we can compromise," Roller Brawl said. She was pleased just to have won the competitive portion.

Nightfall watched silently as the vampire started to push the second to last bed away from the wall. She smiled inwardly as the vampire had a little difficulty doing this, as she was standing on wheels. Great for speed and agility, not so great for for brute force. Once she got the bed far enough out of the way, she turned the end of the first one so that the length of it was against the wall with the window. Seeing what she was doing, Nightfall helped Roller Brawl slide the other bed to the opposite wall so it was parallel with the first bed.

"That works," Stealth Elf said. She was glad some skylanders could settle a disagreement without someone ending up in the infirmary. She herself had taken the bed under the window, to no objections. She preferred to be as close to the outside world as possible.

"I need to go get something from the Sky Slicer," Stormblade said, leaving the cabin.

"Well, since no one cares about sticking to the original design of this place…" Splat proceeded to move her bed over to the opposite wall, positioning it so the two doors were in between her and Nightfall.

Stormblade returned with a large bundle under one arm. She pulled out two of her feather blades and threw them at the ceiling. They drove deep into the wood. She then unfolded the bundle and tied the ends of it to the blades embedded in the ceiling. Using the last bed as a springboard, Stormblade jumped into her hammock.

"Sweet." Stealth elf looked up at the bird swinging contently in her hammock.

"I know right?" Stormblade said, beaming. "I've had this thing since I first decided to explore the ends of skylands."

"We should get rid of that bed then," Splat said. "It'll open up this place up a bit."

"Ok, but leave the mattress," Stormblade said.

"Why leave the- oh." Stealth Elf looked up at the two blades that were the only things holding up the bird.

"It doesn't happen often, but occasionally the blades will, ah, lose their grip. I'd prefer a soft landing than another broken arm."

"Ouch," Roller Brawl commented.

"Can I paint this place?" Splat asked unexpectedly.

"Say what now?"

"Can I paint this place," she asked again.

"You want to paint the cabin?" Stealth Elf asked her.

"It'll only take an hour or so," she said getting excited. "This place is just so boring." Again she carefully examined the wooden walls, paying close attention to every detail.

"I don't have a problem with that," Stormblade said.

"I do have a problem with neon colors though," Nightfall spoke up. "And paint on my bed."

"I promise I'll be careful," Splat told her.

"Fine, just no bright colors on my end."

"Deal. You guys are gonna have to leave though. I can't have anyone in here while I work my magic."

"Let's go see how the boys are doing," Stealth Elf suggested.

* * *

"Trigger Happy," Spitfire was trying to keep his fiery temper in check. "Please tell me why you thought it would be a good idea to bring your firecrackers inside."

"I didn't think it be a _good_ idea."

Spitfire rubbed his forehead in exasperation."And can you tell me why you _lit them_?!"

"No clue!" The gremlin burst out giggling and started jumping on one of the beds. The rest of the boys weren't having quite as much fun as he was.

Half the room was now scorched, and the other half a complete mess. Someone's open suitcase had been dumped and scattered all over the floor. One of Pop's potion ingredients has spilled, leaving a pile of green… something. They had tried to turn a couple of the beds into bunks to make some room, but it hadn't gone to well. The beds were designed so that they could be arranged into bunks, and Dive Clops had even found a set of directions in a desk in the sitting area. But now there were several collapsed beds near the doorway. Thanks to High Volt and Thrillipede, there was at least one complete bunk. They were now trying to reassemble the remaining three.

"Come on Jet Vac, why can't I have the top bunk?" Astroblast was saying. "I never get top bunk."

"Because I have seniority rights," Jet Vac told him. "And that means I get to override any dibs, as you called it, of a junior member. Besides, you can have the top of the next bunk once Thrillipede and High Volt are done."

"Nu-a," Thrillipede said. "It was hard enough building the one bunk, thank you."

"We can manage one more," High Volt said. "If it helps keep the peace." He personally enjoyed the challenge. Most tech elements enjoyed a good puzzle. Although, it was a little difficult in the crowded space.

"Fine, fine. Just one more, ok?"

"Great!" Astroblast said.

"I think I'm gonna go for a swim," Gill Grunt said. He had been closest when Trigger Happy's firecrackers went off, so he was covered in soot. He made a beeline for the door, desperate to escape the chaos.

"So how are we gonna decide who sleeps on the floor? Arm wrestle?" Terrafin asked those who were listening. While their cabin was twice the size of the girls cabin, it was still only meant to hold ten skylanders. That meant three of them had to sleep on the floor.

"I don't think that would be very fair, I mean, why should someone get a bed just because they're stronger than someone else? And what if someone were to have a broken arm, or no arms at all?"

"Why are you complaining Smash Hit? You'd probably win!" Terrafin said. He looked at the warsupial's strong chest and arm muscles. He had been tossing his wrecking ball around for most of his life, so he probably wouldn't have any trouble tossing a few skylanders around.

"Yeah, and everyone here has arms," Pop Fizz pointed out. He was carrying an armload of flasks and jars into the sitting area. "And last I checked, which isn't saying much, there haven't been any broken bones lately."

"I technically don't have any arms," Dive Clops reminded them.

Before anyone could argue further, there was a knock at the door.

Fiesta was the first one to the door, much to Trigger Happy's disappointment. "Well hello amigos, how nice of you to drop by. What can we do for you?"

From outside Stealth Elf said, "We were just coming by to see how you all were….." She trailed off as the door was opened a bit further.

"Woah," Roller Brawl said, skating in. "It's like one of Trigg's fireworks went off in here or something."

"That's exactly what happened," Spitfire said. "Where's Splat and Nightfall gone off to?" He liked to keep a mental check of where everyone was at.

"Nightfall wanted to check out the training field," Stormblade said. She walked in and sat down on the closet bed. "Splat's having a little fun in our cabin. So what was that explosion we heard?"

"Oh, um, that was my fault," said Eruptor, a little embarrassed. "See, I was helping Pop unload because he had such a huge amount of stuff, and well, turns out I wasn't completely over my road sickness." He looked down at the floor in shame.

"Called it!" Roller Brawl said triumphantly.

"That was the last of my powdered manx claw too!" Pop Fizz shouted from the sitting room.

"I said I was sorry!" Eruptor shouted back. He was getting a little heated. "It was an accident!"

"You know what?" Stealth Elf said. "It appears you've got everything under control here." She grabbed her roommates by the wrists and pulled them back outside. "Were gonna go catch up with Nightfall." The door closed behind them.

"Ok, so back to the task at hand," Terrafin clapped his hands together. "Sleeping arrangement."

"We could rotate who sleeps on the floor," Jet Vac suggested.

"NO!" was the immediate answer from several of the skylanders.

"Pop, you can't use the entire sitting room as your lab," Spitfire said.

"Where else can I put all this?"

"You didn't think of that beforehand?"

"No, not really."

Spitfire sighed. "We can build you a shack when we build the tracks, alright? Until then, only unpack the essential ingredients."

"Good plan! Just, eh, one problem."

"What?"

"They're all essential ingredients," he said, waving to the piles of jars on the couches.

Spitfire groaned.

* * *

It took a while, but all the supercharges finally managed to meet up again as the sun was going down.

Thanks to High Volt volunteering, everyone voting on Terrafin because he was being annoying about it, and the girl's spare bed, the boys finally figured out their sleeping arrangement.

Gill Grunt had returned from his swim, now soot-free. He'd had some difficulty trying to get it out from behind his ear fins, but all was well in the end.

Splat had finished her work in an hour as promised, but the others had yet to see it. They had all got caught up messing around in the training fields.

Now they were gathered once more around a blazing fire. The smell of roasting hot dogs and marshmallows wafted across the entire island. The sky itself had turned into a blazing inferno as the sun's last rays scattered across the horizon.

"Alright, who's got a good campfire story?" Astroblast asked. He leaned back against his tree, enjoying the calm evening.

"Do you mean like a scary story, or just any old story," Jet Vac asked him. Astroblast shrugged in response.

"Ooh, we could have a story competition," Splat suggested. "We'll recount the scariest moment of our lives before becoming a skylander! Whoever has the scariest story wins. Judges can't participate."

"I think I like where this is heading," Jet Vac said. He sat up straighter on his stump.

"Who'll be the judges?" Gill Grunt asked.

Nightfall raised her hand. "I'll judge." She didn't particularly feel like telling everyone what scared her.

"Me too," High Volt said

"And I'll make three," Spitfire said. "Who's up first?"

"My idea, I go first" Splat said. She sprinted closer to the fire. "As you all know, I grew up in the most boring place in all of skylands."

"I could argue with that," Nightfall said.

"New rule, no interrupting until whoever's telling the story has finished." Splat smiled mischievously at Nightfall. "Or you may find some extra 'color' to your bed."

Nightfall stopped talking.

"So, like I said, I grew up in the most boring place in all of skylands. In case you haven't figured it out yet, boredom does not suit me very well. So rather than accept my life as it was, I constantly snuck off and picked fights with chompies and other nuisances. I got away with it for years. But then one day my best friend decided she just _had_ to know what I did everyday after school. She wouldn't leave me alone about it, but I couldn't tell her because she practically breathed the laws of our tribe. We ended up getting in a huge fight. Next day, I went out like I always did. I wasn't over the fight, so I was taking my anger out on a few chompies, fighting more aggressively than I usually did. She had followed me, and she watched everything I did. It wasn't until I had killed the last chompie that I saw her standing there. Before I could try to explain or reason with her, she ran off to tell the elders everything. By the time I made it back to the tribe, it was too late. I was immediately brought before the elders. I had never been so terrified as when all twenty elders, who had all seemed nice and understanding before, glared down at me with fury. The ranted on about how I, with my violent actions, threatened the very foundation of the tribe. The said it would destroy everything that they had worked to build. That I would bring about misery to all fauns. What was even wors was that my own grandfather was one of the elders, and he was more furious than any of the others. They had sent me to a separate room to discuss my fate when the drow attacked. And than things just worked out from there." Splat clapped her hands together. "On that happy note, who's next?"

"Hold up, I've got a question," Gill Grunt said. "About that friend you mentioned."

"Lily," Splat said.

"Right. So what happened to her? Did you ever make up?"

Splat pawed at the ground with one hoof. "I haven't really seen her since then."

He nodded, understanding.

"I think I'd like to go," Dive Clops spoke up. Everyone turned to listen. "For me, the scariest moment of my life was after I got hit by the cannon that knocked my wings off. I spent days rolling around in the darkest parts of the ocean. There were no colorful reefs or friendly dolphins where I fell. I saw the darkest most vile things that lurk in the watery depths. I had no means of protection, only the hope that I looked like a rock to most of them." He gave a slight bow to let them know he had finished.

"So who's in the lead, Spitfire?" Splat asked, hoping that she hadn't already been topped. She didn't expect to win, but she certainly didn't want to go down in last place.

"Not sure yet, let's hear some more stories first."

"How about you Thrill?" Terrafin asked. "You ought to have some good stories with your military background and all."

"Well, now that you mention it…"

Big. Mistake. Fifteen minutes later…

"... then Buzz and I ran away as fast as we could. We barely escaped with our lives."

There was a momentary silence as everyone tried figure out what the 'scariest moment' was. He hadn't been too clear. "Intense," Terrafin finally said. The truth was he'd only been able to follow half of what Thrillipede had said.

"Any volunteers to go next?" Spitfire asked the group.

"Sure, I'll go," Roller Brawl said. "The number one scariest moment of my life, without a doubt, was when when Kaos declared his 'true love' to me and asked if I would join him on an endless quest of evil."

"What did you tell him?" Stormblade prompted.

"I didn't say anything. My brothers on the other hand had a few-"

"How does this qualify as scary?" Terrafin interjected.

"Yeah," Astroblast agreed. "Creepy, sure, but not really scary."

"You wouldn't be scared if Kaos randomly walked up to you and basically ask you to marry him?"

"Well...," he said, weighing the options. "I still think it's a little more in the creepy category than the scary category."

"Whatever," Roller Brawl said, rolling her eyes at him. "If that's not scary enough for you, there was this one time that I ran into Wolfgang when I was four."

"That, I'd like to hear," Terrafin said. A few others sat up straighter.

"To be honest, I don't actually remember it all that well," she said. "The only reason I do remember it is probably because of the two hour lecture about talking to strangers I got afterwards." She was met with disappointment.

"We should probably all head to bed anyway," Spitfire said, checking the time. It's getting late, and I want you all awake enough for battle training tomorrow."

"Aw, come on," Stormblade complained. "I haven't gotten a turn yet."

"No more stories tonight, or we'll all be here till morning."

"So who won?" Splat asked.

"Um…" Spitfire had completely forgotten about being a judge. He looked over at Nightfall, who was supposed to help him. She just shrugged, to tired to really care. He looked over at High Volt, but he had fallen asleep against a tree. "Since not everyone has gotten a chance to go yet, well continue another night," he said.

There were a few mumbles and complaints (and a few snores), but everyone agreed to go to bed.

"Since we drove for most of the day today," Spitfire informed them, "we'll be doing battle training tomorrow. Maybe we can play a game."

With the prospect of playing a battle game tomorrow, the skylanders more willingly headed for their cabins.

* * *

 **I forgot to mention earlier that I will only update on Mondays and Tuesdays, just to simplify things. If I don't update one week, I won't until the next Monday.**

 **Tell me if you'd like the stories (as separate projects) of Splat making up with her friend and Roller Brawl running into Wolfgang at age four. I'll probably do them both eventually. Feel free to vote on who should win the scariest story competition.**

 **Icepelt2000: Thanks for the support. And yes, I know, I'm a horrible speller. Runs in the family.**

 **The next chapter will be: Capture the Team**


	3. Chapter 3, Capture the Team

It was late, and all the skylanders were tired.

"Come _on_ guys, hurry up! I've waited long enough to show you what I've done."

 _Almost_ all the skylanders were tired.

"Splat, is waiting five more minutes really that difficult?" Stealth Elf asked the somehow still energetic faun.

"Yes!" Splat knew her friends were tired, but was YOit really that difficult to walk a little faster to the place they wanted to go anyway? Seriously, the sooner they got to the cabin, the sooner they could all go to bed. But first… "Alright, you guys ready?" Splat asked as she walked up to the cabin's wooden door.

"No," Nightfall said. It wasn't that she doubted Splat's artistic abilities, she just didn't trust the fauns taste. She was really hoping that the room hadn't turned into an explosion of bright colors.

Ignoring Nightfall, Splat opened the door wand walked in, sitting down on her bed and smiling proudly.

There _had_ been an explosion of color, but not so that it was painful to look at. On the floor, formed into what looked like a swirling whirlpool, was a spectrum of color. These weren't the ordinary colors of the color wheel though, they were the elemental colors. Splat had carefully designed it so that the proper element color aligned with the beds' occupants element. Starting at Splat's bed, it was a rich purple shot through with lighter and darker shades with pink streaks throughout. None of the colors were solid, all being made up of a combination of streaked hues and shades. As the circle reached tored Nightfall's bed, the pinks died out and the purples darkened. It became mostly black, with purple shot throughout. Most of the purple was dark, but occasionally there was a streak of lavender to provide contrast as well as a few blue hues. As the circle moved on to Roller Brawl's end, the purple disappeared entirely and the black faded into thousands of shades of grey's, from nearly white to nearly black. Many of the grey streaks echoed another color, just as shadows allow a slight hint of the color of whatever they are cast over. The circle proceeded to the empty space in between Roller Brawl and Stormblade. The various greys became various dark blues, representing the water element. Occasionally metallic paint simmered within the strokes, like light reflecting off water. The swirl began to blend into lighter blues as it reached Stormblade hammock. It was streaked with iridescent white, representing clouds being shifted by the wind. The light blues became geens. All the greens were the ones you would find out in a forest, such as leaves with light shining through them or the dark pastel of a pin needle. There were long strips of brown here and there, but unlike the rest of the colors, it didn't curve with the rest of the spiral, remaining straight and strong. The greens would pass over the browns, breaking them into smaller parts and continuing the pattern. Yellows started breaking through the greens like rays of light breaking through leaves. The spiral became entirely light yellow and white to represent the light element. The yellows became darker until they became orange. In several spots, the orange was dusted with russet red, like rust. There were also streaks of metallic gold here and there. This was to represent the tech element. The oranges deepened and darkened, becoming brown. The streaks of browns were less various than the other sections, but there were small glimmers of other metallic and shiny colors, like jewels hidden in the earth. The brown became red, representing the fire element. The strokes of reds and occasionally orange often trailed from the spiral's flow, like flames looking to branch out. Finally the reds returned to the purple and pink magic element, completing the spectrum. The colors spiraled slowly tored the center of the floor. As they got close to the center, they trailed off into wisps, leaving the very center empty, like the eye of a hurricane. The wood grain could still be seen through all the colors, giving the piece a slightly aged look, as if it was always like this.

The ceiling was a mirror image of the floor, except for the elemental crests embedded in their proper place. The walls followed the same color scheme, only they were done in a series of random swirls and splotches.

"So," the faun prompt, "what do you guys think?"

"Wow," Stormblade said.

"This is pretty sweet," Roller Brawl agreed.

"Well," Nightfall started to say.

"Oh, come on Nighty," Roller Brawl said, nudging the dreadwalker. "You know you like it."

"Do _not_ call me Nighty," she said, glaring at the vampire. "But you're right, I do like it," she added."

Stealth Elf disappeared from the doorway and popped onto her bed. "So is this what you got to learn in school?" she asked Splat. Stealth Elf laid down on her belly so that she was facing the other skylanders.

"Unfortunately no," Splat said. "This," she gestured to the the paint surrounding them, "is called expressive art. Ya know, something that pops into your head out of nowhere, and you paint it from your heart. It's a free form painting, which is looked down upon in my village. Sure, we learned several techniques, but the only painting that was acceptable and appreciated was the an exact copy of the portrait of 'Great Ancestor Fluty Hoofdancer'," she said in mock voice. "Trust me," she said, reverting her voice back to normal, "it gets old."

Nightfall, who had disappeared into the kitchen, returned with one of the small black fruits and a knife. She sat on her bed and began to carve pieces off the fruit and eat it.

"Hey, Nightfall, what is that," Stormblade asked. "And why is it that you're the only one allowed to eat it?"

"Darkling fruit," she answered. "Native to Fogshadow. Only creatures of the Dark element can eat it."

"What happens if someone who isn't of the dark element tries to eat it," Stormblade asked.

"Then you'll die within the minute." Nightfall cracked up at the birds startled expression. "Kidding," she said. "You'll just get a really bad stomach ache for the rest of the day."

"Alright guys," Stealth Elf said, "I think we should go to bed. We've got training tomorrow."

"We are in bed," Stormblade pointed out.

"You know what I mean."

"Yes, we're all in bed so we can talk for the next hour."

"And I have to spend _four weeks_ with that chatterbird," Nightfall mumbled. She dodged the pillow aimed at her.

* * *

"All right sleeping beauties, get you lazy bums out of bed," Jet Vac called from the doorway of the boys cabin.

"Five more minutes, mom," Astroblast mumbled form under his pillow.

"Yeah Jet," Terrafin said from the floor. "Can't we sleep in a little longer?"

Loud snoring could be heard from Trigger Happy's bed.

"No, you may not sleep in any longer. You've slept in plenty. And I'm not your mother, Astroblast."

"Really? Cause you sure act like it."

"Come on guys, get up," Spitfire said. "It's your own fault you were up so late last night."

"I'm commin," Pop Fizz said. He rolled out of bed and stretched.

"It's only like, six in the morning," Terrafin complained.

"Actually, It's eight sixteen," High Volt said poking into the cabin. "Thrillipede, Fiesta, Dive Clops, and the girls are already out there training." He walked off to the training field to join them.

"Then they're crazy."

The dirt shark may be stubborn and lazy, but Jet Vac knew how to push his buttons. "Didn't you hear High Volt?" he said kneeling down next to the shark. "All the girls are out there making us look bad. I thought we were the men of the group. Unless of course, you don't mind admitting they're tougher than you."

If there was one thing Terrafin hated, it was being shown up by someone, especially if it had to do with strength. But what he hated more than being shown up was being shown up by somebody smaller than him. When he lived with other dirt sharks, the rule generally was the bigger the shark, the tougher they were. "I hate you," he grumbled, getting up.

"That's the spirit ol' chap." Jet Vac slapped him on the back.

Trigger Happy was still snoring and cuddling one of his guns, oblivious to the commotion around him. Gill Grunt was trying to shake him awake. "How is it that he's so energetic in the day, yet sleeps like a rock," Gill Grunt said.

"Well, maybe you just need a rock to wake him up." Smash Hit lifted his wrecking ball, ready to swing it.

"Bad idea!" Spitfire raced over before the warsupial ended up destroying the entire building.

"How about I make a potion that makes an extra loud bang when it explodes?" Pop Fizz suggested.

"Also a bad idea," Spitfire said.

" _Astroblast_!" Jet Vac yelled. "Get your glowing but out of bed!"

* * *

Nightfall and Roller Brawl were fighting. Nightfall stood her ground in the center of the arena while Roller Brawl skated around the edges and attacked on the move. Roller Brawl swerved from the edge so she was skating at Nightfall head on. She threw her boomerangs and skidded to a stop at the same time to avoid a messy collision. Nightfall ducked a second before the fang blades hit her and disappeared. She teleported behind Roller Brawl ready to strike. The vampire ducked her slashes be turning her skates in opposite directions, dropping down and nearly doing the splits. The boomerangs came back around and Nightfall had to block them, not knowing how to actually catch them to use against her opponent. Roller Brawl used the dreadwalker's momentary distraction to grab her blades and get away. The move she had used was great for avoiding surprise attacks, but left her vulnerable. The two continued to fight, exchanging attacks and dodging each other. Both used attacks usually saved for the battlefield, as the could deal serious damage.

"Um," Pop Fizz said to Spitfire, "ya sure they aren't going to kill each other?"

"No," Spitfire admitted. "But I hope they don't."

Over in the field, Splat was deflecting feather blades, daggers, and grenades with her paint staff. Two target dummies stood behind her, one upright and one laying down. Thrillipeade, Stormblade, and Stealth Elf were not aming directly at Splat, they were trying to hit the dummies behind her. Splat kept knocking the weapons away but, despite her efforts, was getting overwhelmed. The dummy standing upright had a blade and two daggers logged in it while the one laying down had a blackened leg. The three attackers never spread out so much that it forced her to defend two fronts, but they did stretch her pretty tight. High Volt rushed in with his shield lifted to give the faun some aid. With the added help, Splat could now work in her own attacks and lob paint at her attackers. Stealth Elf had to duck and roll to avoid getting hit by one. She she came back up shooting.

"You sure _they_ aren't going to kill each other?"

Spitfire shrugged. "Again, I don't know." He knew they were fighting rather aggressively, but he wasn't worried. He trusted his teammates not to kill or severely injure each other. Most of the time.

"You think _they're_ fighting hard?" Terrafin cracked his knuckles. "Wait till I get in the ring."

"I'll fight you," Stealth Elf said from behind him.

Terrafin jumped and yelped in surprise. "Don't do that, Elf," he said in annoyance. She giggled and popped over to the refreshment table. "But yes, I accept your challenge he added."

"Maybe we should play that game Spitfire mentioned last night before we ware ourselves out," Dive Clops suggested.

"Yes, and what game did you have in mind, Spitfire," Jet Vac asked the fire demon.

"Let's get everyone over here first," he said. "Everybody, stop fighting!" he called out across the field. Either they were ignoring him or they couldn't hear him because nobody paused what they were doing. "Great," he muttered. Shouting was a method that usually didn't work as there were always frequent shouting fits among skylanders. Most skylanders learned to block it out, especially when absorbed in combat. "Looks like I have to go break them apart. Cross your fingers they don't accidentally kill me."

"Umm…"

"He means wish him luck, Eruptor," Gill Grunt said.

"No need!" Trigger Happy said. He handed something to Spitfire.

Spitfire looked at the megaphone Trigger Happy had handed him. "Where did you find- wait, did you make this?"

"U-ha!"

"Just now?"

"Yep."

"Where the heck did you- ya, know what, never mind." Spitfire put the megaphone to his mouth. "Team meeting everyone! Stop trying to kill each other and get over here!" Spitfire handed the megaphone back to Tigger Happy, who received it eagerly. "Thanks. I'll probably need that later."

This time the fighting stopped. Spitfire beckoned them over and they came to see what he wanted.

"So, what game are we playing, amigo," Fiesta asked once everyone was present.

"I was thinking we could play capture the team in the woods. It might help us explore the area."

"Great, except for that it's going to be a totally unfair game," Pop Fizz said.

"We can mix up the teams," Spitfire said.

"No way!" Stealth Elf argued. "That would defy skylander tradition!"

"Um, _you're_ complaining?" Terrafin said.

The first game of capture the team had started from a disagreement between two skylanders. Actually, most skylander games are born from quarles, but that's beside the point. In this case, Riptide had been trying to impress Punk Shock and became annoying about it. There were constant 'let me handle this's and 'I'v got that sweety's that nearly drove her up a wall. He became really cocky about his abilities, along with a group of his friends. Finally fed up, (actually, she'd been fed up for a long time now), Punk Shock gathered a group of her girlfriends and challenged Riptide to a game called 'capture the team'. The rules since then have been greatly modified, but one thing remained the same, becoming a tradition. The teams were always boys vs girls.

"We can handle it," Stealth Elf said.

"Well, if you really want to," Terrafin said.

"You realize that you are nearly at a three to one ratio, don't you," High Volt asked the elf.

She shrugged. "We can use that to our advantage."

"Ok fine," Spitfire said, tired of the discussion. "I'm pretty sure you all know the rules, but I'm gonna go over them incase you forgot anything. The first team to 'capture' all the members of the opposing team wins. If you are knocked out in battle, surrender in battle, or are caught in a trap for longer than five minutes, you are out of the game. We won't be playing the break out version, so people who are out go to the training field until the game is over. Fights can be two against one or two against two, but that's the maximum. Three against one is playing dirty. We'll be on opposite ends of the forest to start. We get fifteen minutes to plan and prepare, but can't enter the forest until the game begins. Traps have to be set during the action. Everyone got it?"

"Hold on, where are we setting the terms?" Pop Fizz asked.

"How about ultimate bragging rights," Stealth Elf suggested.

"Deal!" he said immediately.

"Shouldn't the rest of the team get a say?" Fiesta asked him.

"The rights sounds good to me," Terrafin said.

"Since the teams are so uneven, I agree to," Thrillipede said.

"Bragging rights it is then," Spitfire said. "Or else we'll be discussing it all day," he added to himself.

* * *

The teams were positioned to the north and south of the forest, girls on the north end, boys on the south. They were only allowed to use natural resources and their regular weapons.

"We are so gonna lose," Roller Brawl said once the other team was out of sight. "You know that right?" She wasn't the only one with doubts about the game's outcome.

"Not if we play our cards right," Stealth Elf argued. "So here's the plan…"

* * *

"Don't you think we should have a plan?" Jet Vac asked Spitfire.

"To take out five little girls? Seriously?" Terrafin said.

"Yeah, it shouldn't be that hard," Eruptor agreed.

"Don't get too over confident," Thrillipede warned them.

"I don't think we need a full on plan," Spitfire said, "but stick to teams of two or three, so we can hold the advantage."

"You mean so we can fight two against one, don't you, Spitfire," Gill Grunt asked. The flame spirit shrugged.

Trigger Happy's pre set horn blared in the distance, signaling that the fight had begun.

* * *

"Well amigos, that was humiliating," Fiesta said as he and his team left the woods.

"It was only because of Elf's stupid traps," Terrafin said in annoyance. "Seriously, they only took out, like, three of us in actual combat."

"Maybe we can argue that luck was against us because thirteen is supposedly an unlucky number," Trigger Happy said.

"Yeah, the only one that'll convince is Tuff Luck," Gill Grunt said.

"We fell for their tricks fair and square," Dive Clops said. "Hook, line, and sinker."

"Why did we agree to the stupid bragging rights?!" Pop Fizz moaned.

"You can't talk!" Terrafin yelled at him.

"Yes he can," Smash hit said. "But I thought I saw Nightfall bring some duct tape. We can ask her to let us use it to make it so that Pop can't talk any more."

"We might just have to next time," Jet Vac agreed. Pop glared at him. "At the same time, I agree that agreeing to the ultimate bragging rights was a bad move. It's not like we would have anything to brag about even if we did win. Now the entire academy probably knows about this." Ultimate bragging rights allowed the victors of a game to post pictures, videos, and so on on any social media that they so choose. It was the fastest way to spread humiliation.

"With any luck, everyone will have forgotten this by the time we get back," Gill Grunt said.

"Not likely," Jet Vac sighed.

* * *

"I still can't believe your plan actually worked." Roller Brawl smiled at her elf friend, "I'm glad it did though."

"I can!" Stormblade said. "We were totally awesome!"

"What other option did we have?" Stealth Elf said.

"Your right," Stormblade said, "being awesome is the only option." Stealth Elf rolled her eyes.

"Congrats on your victory," Spitfire told them. "But don't get used to it," he added.

"You're not saying that you went easy on us, are you?" Nightfall warned.

"Maybe a little at first," He admitted. "Then you actually started to win."

"Well, that's your own fault," Stormblade said.

* * *

"Hey look!" Gill Grunt said. "I'm getting a call from Spyro." He flipped his computer on and pulled up the dragon on facetime. "What's up Spyro?" He lounged back against the head of his bed.

"Hey there Gill. How's the first day been?" Spyro asked.

"Not bad," he said.

"Really? Rumor has it that you and the other guys got your tails whipped in capture the team today."

"Don't tell me that's the only reason you're calling," Terrafin said as he sat next to Gill Grunt.

"Alright, I won't. Spitfire around?" he asked.

"I'm right here," Spitfire said. He walked into the room from the kitchen with a small cup of gasoline. It acted like an energy drink to fire demons. He sat down on the bed next to Gill Grunt's.

"So tell me about it," Spyro said as Gill grunt turned the laptop so that Spitfire could see as well. "I'll call Elf later to get her side of the story and to fill in anything you might have left out, but I want to hear your side first."

"They played a nasty trick on us," Terrafin said. "The end."

"Sound's like Elf," Spyro said. "Give me the details."

"Well," Spitfire said, "I had my team split up into pairs so we could take advantage of the two against one rule. Elf scouted ahead of her team and directed them to the groups they were less likely to be felled by. They didn't fight to take us out though, they were buying time and trying to stay in the game. Since all of the girls were split up, no one noticed Elf's absence the entire game. In our defence it was a big forest. Anyway, apparently she started off by building small traps and setting them whenever one of the fights started to go badly for her team. Those weren't very strong traps and most of us escaped. I think Stormblade accidently set one off too. We about to finish them off when Elf set her real plan into action. She somehow gave a signal to the others and they began to pull back. We thought they were just close to defeat, so we chased chased after them."

"Lemme guess," Spyro said. "You either ran into a giant net or a large pit."

"Both. We were coming from two directions. Nightfall teleported across the net and Stormblade glided over it. The covering on the pit was enough to support Roll and Splat as they crossed, but gave way under six skylanders."

Spyro looked a little thoughtful. "Those must have taken a while two build. There's no way that they could have just held you off for that long."

"Some of us went a little easy on them at first because we felt kinda bad," Spitfire admitted. "Won't make that mistake again."

"Well, it is officially the number one topic at the academy right now," Spyro said. "I've gotta run now, so see ya later."

The screen on Gill Grunt's laptop went blank.

* * *

"Are you guys seeing this?" Pop Fizz asked, holding up his phone angrily.

"Um, no not really," Eruptor said. He, Pop Fizz, and Astroblast, were hanging out by the training field. Or rather, Eruptor was hanging out in the training field and Pop and Astroblast were hanging out on their phones.

"I know right?," Astroblast said, speaking over Eruptor. "I'm getting texts and emails from like, all the skylanders at the academy!"

"Wish I got texts and emails," Eruptor mumbled.

"And have you seen the video they posted?!" Pop continued. "Stealth was recorded the entire the final capture, and now it's everywhere! Soo humiliating."

"I wanna see," Eruptor said. He'd been one of the few skylanders beaten in actual combat.

Astroblast leaned over to look at Pop Fizz's screen. "Whoa, you've got way more messages than I do."

"That's because I'm one of the senior superchargers. You're still pretty young, so they don't care if you fall for a trick quite so much. Me on the other hand…"

"Man, I wish I could have a phone," Eruptor said sadly. Neither Pop nor Astroblast seemed to hear him.

"Oh no," Pop said.

"What is it?" Astroblast asked, trying to peer at Pop's phone again.

"This is really bad."

"Ooh, this ought to be good then," Astroblast said getting excited. "What is it?"

"A text from Master Eon! Well, from Eon through Hugo, but it's like, a mile long!"

"Can I read it?"

"NO!"

"I'd still like to see that video," Eruptor said vainly.

"This is so not fair!" Pop Fizz turned off his phone and faced the other two. "We need revenge to win back our honor."

"You mean, like a prank?" Astroblast asked uncertainly.

"Whoa," Eruptor said stepping between them and made himself heard. "We agreed to the rights, guys."

"I know," Pop said, "but prank wars happen all the time anyway. Besides, I've developed an ink that doesn't wash off for twenty-four hours. It'll be the perfect chance to try it out!"

"No way," Eruptor said. "Spitfire would be furious if we tried to, um, what exactly are you planning?"

"Draw on them in their sleep of course."

"Well if you guys want to do it, then fine, but leave me out of it." With that Eruptor left the other two and went back to his cabin.

"His loss," Pop Fizz shrugged. "You in Astroblast?"

"Yeah, I'm in. You think we should invite anyone else?" he asked. "Maybe Terrafin. He seemed rather put off by their gloating earlier."

"We can ask," Pop said. "But we should keep it at that. We don't want too large a group."

"Got it. So- uh-oh." Astroblast pointed to the small blue ghoul that had been spying on them. It saw that he had been spotted and quickly ran off.

"After him!" Pop said. "We can't let him tell Fiesta what we're planning."

"Too late, amigo." Fiesta, walked up to them, his bandmates following. "You plan to pull a nasty prank, no?"

"I wouldn't say nasty," Astroblast said, "but yes." The skeletal man raised his eyebrow at them.

"Aw comon, Fiesta," Pop pleaded. "Please don't tell anyone?"

"I don't think I need need to, Pop," Fiesta said, shrugging.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Pop asked.

Fiesta chuckled. "Actually I think you should go right ahead. Though, I will warn you, you'll probably regret it. Record it for me, will you?"

"Uh, ok," Pop Fizz said. "And then we can post it," he added.

"Well, good luck amigos. I will not to say anything." Fiesta left them to carry on with their plans. He knew how this would end. If they wanted to pull a prank, he'd let them find out the hard way that it was a dumb idea.

"So," Astroblast turned his attention back to Pop Fizz, "I've got a question. Are the rumors about Elf sleeping with daggers under her pillow true?" he asked.

"Oh, the rumors are totally true. But don't worry, I've got some safety goggles we can use."

"That won't stop her from killing us, will it?"

"Probably not. We'll worry about that later."I

* * *

Later that night…

"I'm starting to have doubts about this," Astroblast whispered.

"You can't back out now," Terrafin whispered back. "Not when we're so close."

"I'm not saying we should back out," Astroblast said defensively. He never backed out of anything. "I'm saying we'll probably regret this." The chat with Fiesta earlier had made him a little nervous. He had promised not to say anything, but that didn't mean that they were in the clear.

Pop Fizz put a finger to his lips and he carefully opened the door. They couldn't afford the slightest sound. Fortunately for them, the door swung inward silently. Stormblade had wasted no time in oiling it that morning. They crept into the dark room, carefully placing each step. Astroblast and Terrafin crouched low to make themselves less noticeable. Pop didn't have to.

They came to a stop at the center of the color swirl to survey the room. There were no signs of stirring from any of the beds. Terrafin looked up at Stormblade's hammock hopelessly. There was no now way to get up there without waking someone.

Pop pulled out his ink vile and swirled its contents slowly. He was about to give the signal to begin the next phase of the plan when there was an eruption of movement. Pop Fizz, Terrafin, and Astroblast froze for a split second, and before they had time to react, something hit their faces and the something sticky and wet burst across their eyes, nose, and mouth.

Terrafin wiped the goop off his face to find various types of blades aimed at his throat. Pop also cleared his eyes, yet Astroblast kept his closed. All three of them raised their hands in surrender. The lights were switched on.

"Oh, it's just you," Nightfall said and relaxed her pose.

"Were you guys seriously trying to prank us?" Stealth Elf asked them.

"Mmmaaaybeee?" Pop tried.

"Come on guys, that's low," Roller Brawl said.

"Excuse me, Astroblast said. He still had his eyes tightly shut. "What is on my face?"

"Paint," Splat said. "I always have a few paintballs on hand. You might want to clear your eyes of it. It's enchanted, so onece it dries, it won't wash off for twenty-four hours." Astroblast hurried to scrape as much of it off as he could.

"Hey, is that a camera?" Stealth Elf popped to the outside of the window, grabbed the device, and reappeared back inside. "Let's see if the recording is any good." She began to rewind it.

Suddenly, an alarm blared in the distance. Everyone covered their ears at the screeching sound.

"What is that," splat asked.

"It's the emergency alarm," Stealth elf said in realization. "We're getting a call from the academy."

"Yes! An edventure!" Stormblade exclaimed.

"Simmer down, Sunshine," Nightfall said. "It probably isn't anything good."

"Let's go find out," Stealth Elf said. She tossed the camera aside and hurried to the radio station, the others not far behind.

* * *

 **I know I skimmed over the action in this chapter, but that's because there's going to be a lot of it in the next... every chapter. This one is just silly fun and some random ideas I had. The next chapters are going to focus a little more on the plot.**

 **Also, I probably won't be able to update weekly, but I'll try.**

 **The next chapter is: Bone Bashed. (No, it's not focused on Roller Brawl. I'm going to pun several names.)**


	4. Chapter 4, Island of Ice

**I realised that "Bone Bashed was waaaayyy to long, so I split it into two chapters. ;)**

* * *

The radio station was a small and boxy building, just like everything else on the island. It was built to withstand the harshest weather and most brutal attacks. The interior was lined with outdated technology. Most of the wiring was contained in large metal boxes, and the controls were linked into a grey panel at the end of the room.

Spitfire pressed a large button on the panel and spoke into the radio, "Spitfire, checking into the academy, what's the emergency?"

Snapshot's voice came through from the other end, "Hey, Spitfire, sorry we called so late, but this is important."

Spitfire yawned. "No problem, only half of us were asleep."

The crocagator chuckled. "The whole team there and listening?" he asked, becoming serious again.

Spitfire pressed down on the button again. "We're all here," he said. "Most of us are listening." He glanced at the warsupial that had passed out on his wrecking ball. Come to think of it, how had he managed to even fit it through the door?

"Good enough," Snapshot said. "I'm calling you because-"

"Oh hey, is that the Superchargers?" another voice carried through.

"Short Cut!" Snapshot yelled. "What are you doing? You know you're not supposed to be in here. And didn't Ka-boom ask you to show him how to use the stilts tonight?"

"I did show him. Lets just say he's not very good at it."

"What are you doing in here then?"

"I need a little help carrying him to the infirmary. In case you haven't noticed, he's huge."

Snapshot gave an exasperated sigh. "Looks like I've gotta make this quick Superchargers," he said. "We've finally gotten some info about Nightshade."

Stealth Elf's ears perked up at this. The prolonged silence of the thief had left her on edge for a while now. She wanted to hear every detail.

"So apparently," Snapshot said, "he's been hiding on a island called The Isle of Frozen Fire. I think it's called 'Frozen Fire' because it's so cold up there that even fire will freeze."

"Um," Eruptor started to say.

"Not literally," Snapshot said. "Anyhow, the entire thing has been uninhabited for years. It consists of a large, icy, barren wasteland, sprinkled with a few scrawny trees and a mountain. Snows almost daily."

"I was actually gonna say that's not what 'frozen fire' means," Eruptor mumbled. His voice was too low to be heard on Snapshot's end though, so the crocagator just continued.

"Our sources, well, Spy Rise's sources more specifically, believe that Nightshade is trying to form a band of anti-skylanders to take us down. It's nearly grown into a small army."

"I knew he was up to something," Stealth Elf hissed. Spitfire signaled for her to be quiet.

"What does this have to do with us?" Spitfire asked. "And what's so urgent about it that that you have to tell us so late at night?"

"Morning now, actually," Short Cut chimed in.

"I know you're on your retreat an' all that," Snapshot said, "but the Isle of Frozen Fire is only a few hours north of you, an' you're the ones with them rift engines. Nightshade needs to be taken out before he gets any stronger or moves to a new location. We figured that the eighteen of you would be able to handle it until us trappers get there."

"No problem," Spitfire said. "This is more exciting than building race tracks anyway."

"Good." Snapshot said. "You should sleep the rest of tonight, but leave as early as possible."

"Alright," Spitfire said. "When should we expect you to arrive?"

"Probably the following morning. It's a long distance, and we don't have fancy vehicles."

"So basically you want us to do the dirty work and then you'll put em in jail," Spitfire confirmed.

"Exactly!" Short Cut exclaimed. "Now we should go before Ka-boom bleeds out."

"WHAT?!"

The radio connection was cut off.

"Well, you heard him," Spitfire said to his half asleep team. (Half of them were literally asleep.) "Looks like we've finally got a mission."

* * *

It was early in the morning, really early. The sun had barely made it above the horizon, yet the island was full of activity. Eighteen skylanders worked together to get ready for the upcoming battle. Unlike when they left for the retreat, they were relatively quiet. This was partially because none of them had gotten a full night's sleep, but it was also because of the weight of the matter. There were times to be loose and playful, and there were times to be focused. This was definitely a time to be focused. With the one exception Trigger Happy, who couldn't get over the ridiculous appearance of his paint stained friends.

They were quickly on the move, heading north to the colder regions. It was still early morning when they reached the edge of Frozen Fire island.

The mountain was at the center of the island, casting a long shadow. The vast majority of the rest of the island was a barren plain of snow. Trees gathered around the rim of the cliff and scattered about the plain.

It was at one of those clusters of trees that the skylanders stopped to discuss their plain.

"Alright," Spitfire said in a hushed voice, "I want to avoid being detected for as long as possible. Elf, I want you to take the Stealth Stinger and scout the mountain, that's most likely where they're hidden. Stay in stealth mode, do not engage in any way, shape, or form. Nightfall, I want you to jump to any and every water source on this island. Search for signs of where they might get their water. Again, stay hidden, don't engage. Be back in an hour."

The two nodded and left without question. Spitfire turned to the rest of the group. "Unfortunately, not all our vehicles are so quiet. Terrafin, Fiesta, you two are a team. Jet Vac, Dive Clops, and Thrillipede, and Stormblade. I want you guys to scout the forests on foot. Try not to get spotted. And be back in an hour. The rest of us will wait here. Too many skylanders wandering about will draw attention."

"And what if we get spotted?" Jet Vac asked.

"Flares," Spitfire said. He grabbed some from inside his vehicle and tossed one to each of the teams. All the Superchargers had those for emergencies. "Unless it's a small patrol," Spitfire added. " Then just knock em out and bring them back here. We don't want them to run back and alert the rest of their group if they were to wake up. But it shouldn't come to that because you're going to be extra careful."

"Right," Terrafin said. "And thanks to Splat, I've got some extra camouflage." He gave Splat an annoyed glare. His face was currently colored green, which was fortunate compared to Pop and Astro, who were pink and orange.

"The way I see it, you got what you deserved," Spitfire said. They'd had this discussion already, but Terrafin still didn't want to drop it. "Now go, we're wasting time."

The three teams left without further protest.

"Soooo, the rest of us just sit here?" Pop asked, looking up at Spitfire.

"We'll rotate a lookout, but yeah pretty much. At least until we get some news."

* * *

Stealth Elf brought the Stealth Stinger as close to the ground as she could without disturbing any trees. She leaned out to get a better view of the mountain. As far as she could see, the mountain hadn't been disturbed by anything more than a ground squirrel for years. She'd flown all around it, from base to peak and hadn't found any signs of settlement. Or even someone passing through. She had spotted several caves that would be easy hideouts, but they hadn't been touched. And the entire island was oddly quiet. Too quiet.

Stealth Elf scanned the fields of snow surrounding the mountain. The expanse of the island was huge. If there was a forest covering it, it would have taken days to search, but there wasn't. It was just open, empty fields of snow.

The mountain was empty. She knew it from the first moment she had gotten close to it. Still, she had given it a thorough sweep, and it only proved her suspicion. No one was here.

At the same time, she could sense that there was something lying hidden, something that she couldn't reach from the sky. Spy Rise's sources were the most reliable in all of Skylands, so she didn't doubt that Nightshade and whatever army he was building was here, but she felt like she was missing something . Not that she expected this to be easy. Nightshade was clever, probably the smartest villain of the age.

Stealth Elf shook her head to clear it. Whatever it was, she knew something was off. Very off. Maybe the others were having better luck.

* * *

Jet Vac shivered as the cold air nipped at his face. The wind had picked up a little, blowing some of the snow on the trees onto him. He sighed, making a cloud of breath.

Dive Clops didn't seem all that bothered by the cold. He figured the cold environment wasn't all that different from the deep sea. He was, however, struggling with the deep snow.

Jet Vac cocked his head in hope of hearing any sound other than wind against spruce needles. Nothing. As far as he could tell, this place was completely empty of any life at all. Except, of course, the trees barely hanging onto life. They didn't really count though.

There was a slight grunt from behind him. "Uh, Jet? A little help?"

He sighed. "Again?" He turned to find that Dive Clops had once again sunk up to his eye in snow. There was a layer of icy snow under the powder that Jet Vac managed to stay on top of for the most part, but Dive broke through it every three steps.

"I don't enjoy this any more than you do," he retorted. He shuffled as if trying to lift one of his legs out, but they were too stubby to be of much use in the deep snow.

"You're right," Jet Vac sighed. "It's not your fault, but I wish we could move faster. We haven't found anything even remotely useful, and we're running out of time." He grabbed Dive Clops' arm and helped heave him out. It resulted in Jet Vac sinking to up to his knees and Dive Clops falling onto his back.

"Something tells me," Dive Clops huffed as he struggled to get up, "that we could run across this island and still find nothing."

Jet Vac didn't say anything, but he silently agreed. The place was just too quiet. It had an empty feeling. It was eerie.

As they finally regained their balance, Jet Vac looked at his watch. "We should make our way back to the others. We'll be late if we try to go any further. At this pace anyway."

"Looks like it will snow soon too," Dive Clops said.

Jet Vac looked up at the sky to find his friend was right. "Let's move," he said. "I don't want to be caught in a storm."

* * *

Rocks. Fish. Sand. Dirt. Oh look, more rocks! Another fish. More rocks. Lots of ice. A Cnidarian. Wait a minute, how'd a jellyfish even survive up here? Still, not important. More sand. Another fish. Aaaand more rocks and ice. This was boring.

Nightfall turned the Sea Shadow away from the edge of the lake. There was absolutely nothing interesting here. Or in any body of water on this island. And she'd been through all of them twice. At least.

The lake she was currently in was definitely the biggest, but that wasn't saying much. The entire surface of it was frozen into thick ice, and on top of that, snow. It blended in perfectly with the fields of snow, so you wouldn't know it was even here if you didn't have a water detecting rift engine. And it was impossible to reach the water without a drill. Or rift in her case. But there was nothing here. Nothing. At. All. No water pumps, no pipes, not even a bucket. The place was untouched.

Nightfall sighed and looked at her watch. "Seventeen minutes," she muttered to herself. "Great." Maybe she could check out the river in the mountain again. After all, Spitfire had said that that was where they would most likely be at. Worth a shot, she thought half heartedly.

* * *

Terrafin trudged through the deep snow. His legs ached, but he ignored them. Fiesta followed in the path he'd made. He had offered to take the lead from Terrafin a couple of times, but the land shark had turned him down. He was following a trail that the skeletal man could not.

Terrafin paused in his stride and stomped at the ground, breaking the thin crust of snow and ice. He cleared as much of the white powder as he could, revealing a small patch of earth. Again he stomped at the ground, this time only once. He then stood still and felt the returning vibrations. This wasn't good.

"Amigo," Fiesta said a little exasperated, "may I ask again what it is you are doing?"

"Listening to the earth," Terrafin responded gruffly. He felt a little guilty being so rude to Fiesta, but they were running out of time. He'd explain more later.

Fiesta threw his hands up in defeat. The answer was the same as before. He wasn't going to try to prod the shark any more. A deadly seriousness had come over Terrafin, something that only happened on rare occasions.

Terrafin continued walking in a slightly different direction. Fiesta followed silently.

They continued walking for some time, neither of them speaking. Occasionally Terrafin would stop to "listen to the earth," but their stride was otherwise unbroken.

As time wore on, Fiesta began to continuously glance down at his watch. They would have to turn back soon, but Terrafin showed no sign of stopping. Finally he spoke up.

"We have to go back amigo," Fiesta called up to the land shark. The increasing wind did it's best to whip his voice away.

"No!" Terrafin shouted back almost desperately. "We're too close to stop now. Besides, now that we've broken a trail, we'll get back faster."

"I know that, Terrafin. But ten minutes to cover the distance we traveled in fifty is no small task. We're already going to be late," Fiesta tried to sway him.

Terrafin scanned the area ahead of them. They had reached the edge of the forest, only a few trees and a small, snow covered boulder remained before the long stretch of white leading to the mountain.

"I know we're close," Terrafin insisted, but he knew Fiesta was right. They didn't have any more time. He gave one last desperate look at the remaining trees and boulder. Wait. The boulder!

Terrafin surged forward and began to shove at the large rock. Fiesta gave him a confused look, then started helping him.

Finally the surrounding snow caved in and the stone rolled away. Terrafin stared grimly at what lay beneath, as it confirmed his suspicions.

* * *

The snow had begun to fall, and it came down hard. The gales blew the falling flakes in different directions, making it hard to see more than a few feet.

"They should've been back by now," Stormblade worried. She and Thrillipeade had been the first ones back, and the others followed in quick succession. That is, all except for Terrafin and Fiesta. They were due to arrive twenty minutes ago.

Spitfire didn't respond to her. Instead he focused his senses on the forest in front of him. He strained his eyes to see further, but no matter how hard he willed it, the storm revealed nothing. He listened closely for anything that might indicate his friends' approach.

It was a general rule amongst the team leaders to allow thirty minutes of flex time before sending out a search party. But with the storm's increasing ferocity and the dangerous temperatures, Spitfire wanted to leave now. Terrafin and Fiesta could be in serious danger if even one of them got hurt, or if they got lost.

On the other hand, if he sent out someone to try to find them, he'd be endangering more teammates. So he would wait the last ten minutes, and then go out there himself.

The rest of the Superchargers stood tense and quiet, as if the slightest disturbance would shatter the atmosphere. The engines themselves had also hushed. Even when turned off, the engines gave off a slight hum, but now they sensed the stress of their owners and were quiet.

The silence stretched as seconds ticked by. It was Stealth Elf who finally broke the stillness. "I hear them!" she called from up in one of the tall pine trees. She had wanted to go out there and find them on her own, but Spitfire refused to send anyone out there, especially alone. She yanked her braid out of some spruce rust and popped out of sight.

Spitfire relaxed his rigid pose, sighing in relief. He couldn't hear them yet, but he trusted Elf. She had better hearing than everyone else.

It wasn't long before three blurry figures appeared in the blizzard. They drew closer and their features became more distinguishable.

Terrafin strode in the lead, head bent against the wind and snow. Fiesta followed in his wake with Stealth Elf walking beside him. They were talking, but what they said was drowned by the wind.

"You're late," Nightfall remarked in a bored voice. She didn't bother to look at them as she spoke, just continued to sharpen her hook. The truth was, though she would never admit it out loud, the two knuckle-heads had given her a good scare.

"We were a little preoccupied finding the bad guys," he said to her irritability. He was not in a good mood. The cold tended to do that to him.

"There's no one here," Astroblast said. He kicked at a lump of snow. "Maybe there was, but not anymore. The place is deserted."

"But it can't be!" Smash Hit declared. "We are still here, therefore this place is not yet deserted."

Astroblast rolled his eyes. "Point is-"

"I said we found them," Terrafin cut in. It took a moment for the group to register this.

"But were?" Stormblade asked. "We've scoured the entire island," she spread her winged arms, "and found nothing."

"What if a spell punk did a cloaking spell," Eruptor wondered aloud.

"I don't think a spell punk could cover something as large as this," Gill Grunt said.

"How about we let them tell us," Spitfire spoke above the bickering. He turned and looked at Terrafin expectantly.

"They're here," Terrafin said, "and they don't need no spell punk to hide. Only a land shark could detect them," he said proudly. He pointed to the ground.

"They're beneath us?" Dive Clops asked.

Terrafin nodded. "And Fiesta and I found the entrance." He turned back toward the trees, but his trail was already disappearing. "Somewhere in that direction," he gestured to the general area he had come from.


	5. Chapter 5, Bone Bashed

**This is where the sunshine and rainbows ends.**

* * *

The Shark Tank backed out of the tunnel it had dug. Terrafin climbed out of it and addressed the skylanders waiting around him. "The walls of whatever tunnels they've dug are encased in iron walls," he growled.

Well, there goes plan A, Spitfire thought. They had been hoping to bore right into the tunnel system to find, or make, a space large enough for the other vehicles. It was to risky to create a rift as they had no idea what to expect, or if the tunnels were even big enough for a Supercharger.

"Great," Nightfall said sarcastically. "Now what are we supposed to do? It's not like we can jump down there."

"We go down and fight," Jet Vac hoisted his vacuum gun. "We've fought plenty of battles before without our engines and won."

"It was a far fetched plan anyway," Thrillipeade agreed.

Spitfire nodded. They had definitely lost a big advantage, but that wouldn't hinder them.

"Maybe I should go in and scout ahead," Stealth Elf suggested. "I might be able to find a place for the vehicles." She started forward, but High Volt grabbed her by the collar. Elf twisted and tried to pry his hand off, but he stood firm without much effort.

"No one goes in alone," High Volt said. He addressed the group rather than Elf directly. She was getting very annoyed at how easily he held her back. "It's too risky. A simple cave-in or just getting lost could be the end of you. We don't know how widespread the tunnels are. Or how good their defences will be."

"We're Skylanders, not children!" Stealth Elf argued. She was still trying to break free of High Volt's grasp, but not succeeding. He raised his arm a little and lifted her off the ground. She sighed and gave up.

"No one goes in alone," Spitfire echoed High Volt. He was trying his best to keep a straight face. He knew Stealth Elf would seek revenge if he laughed at her predicament.

"Fine," she growled in defeat. "Now put me down," she hissed. High Volt gently set her back down. She moved away from him, ears still drawn back in frustration. It would be a while till she forgave him for that.

"So here's plan B," Spitfire said. "We drive the land vehicles to where we hid the sky and sea vehicles. Those falling into enemy hands would be bad." He paused in case anyone wanted to object. No one did, so he continued, "Then we go down the tunnel together and take it from there."

"So we're just winging it," Astroblast said.

"Yep. There's not much planning we can do from here."

"But how are we supposed to 'wing it' when none of us even have any wings?" Smash Hit questioned. "I mean-"

"Let's go," Spitfire cut him off. Now wasn't the time to get sucked into a pointless argument.

It took time, but the Skylanders finally got all their machines safely stored away and got back to the tunnel. The storm still raged around them, making it difficult to see. Even with the sun covered though, it was easy to tell that it was afternoon.

Stealth Elf took the lead down the tunnel entrance. She could detect danger quickly and warn the others before disappearing. Just some of the perks to being a ninja. Spitfire followed a little ways behind her with the others in close succession.

The tunnel was narrow and sloped steeply downward. Fortunately there were stairs. Unfortunately someone still managed to slip.

They moved cautiously, carefully placing each step. The darkness was thick, so they had no idea how far down they had to go. They could barely see the person in front of them, save for the few who had night vision.

"This is a long tunnel," Stormblade remarked, breaking the long, tense silence.

"Not a good time to chat, Sunshine." Nightfall had adopted that nickname for Stormblade after their first official Skylander mission together. She generally used it when she wasn't in a good mood.

"It never is with you," the lark shot back. She wasn't in the best of moods either.

The energy level amongst the group rose, the silence having broken into argument. Spitfire knew that soon it would be more than Nightfall and Stormblade talking. They were about to lose the element of surprise. He opened his mouth to tell them to be quiet, but it probably wouldn't regain their previous vigilance. But before he spoke, someone else did.

"Guys, shut up," Roller Brawl said from further up the tunnel.

It was easy to forget, but Roller Brawl was technically one of the senior Superchargers. Her being so blunt sent a clear message. Nightfall and Stormblade glared at each other, but didn't say anything else.

Again they descended without a word.

"The tunnel's widening," Stealth Elf whispered up to the others. She slowed her pace, walking forward tentatively. The steep decline was lessening as well as the tunnel widening. For the first time in what felt like hours Elf could see light ahead. The tunnel leveled out completely and Stealth Elf signaled Spitfire to wait.

She crawled forward, alert for any guards or traps. The exit wasn't far, that was where the light was coming from. She disappeared from sight and moved forward, out of the tunnel. She found herself standing in an enormous cavern. This place was definitely big enough to fit all the Superchargers. More than big enough. There were several tunnels leading off from the cavern, all level with the floor. There were several smaller one across the sides and ceiling. The cavern itself was roughly designed, just a hollowed out cave and a dirt floor. The light came from the ceiling, where Elf guessed there were light fixtures.

She turned in a three-sixty to confirm that they were alone. "There's no one here," she said to the tunnel she had come from.

Spitfire stepped into the light, the rest following his lead.

"Uh… shouldn't there be more guards?" Pop Fizz questioned out loud. He examined the empty cavern. As far as he could see, this place was as empty as the rest of the island.

"Maybe it's designed as a maze made to lead you to traps," Dive Clops suggested. "Those were a popular defence method ten thousand years ago."

A faint off-key humming came from one of the tunnels. The Skylanders froze. They were no longer alone. Several of them rose their weapons, ready for a fight.

From the far end of the cavern, a small cyclops holding a spear walked in. He stopped when he saw the intruders, the song dying in his throat. He dumbly darted his eye to a red alarm button on the wall. He began to shuffle toward it, as if trying to be inconspicuous.

"Stormblade!" Spitfire commanded.

Upon hearing the sudden noise, the cyclops yelped, dropped his spear, and bolted for the alarm button.

Stormblade immediately pulled out a blade, and the next moment it was flying toward her target. The cyclops was moments from the button when it hit him square in the back, causing him to stumble forward. As he fell, his face smacked against the wall… and the button. The little monster looked around dizzily in confusion before he passed out.

"Nice work, Sunshine," Nightfall said sarcastically. She would have said more, but Thrillipeade held a hand up to hush her. There was silence only silence.

"Shouldn't something be going beep! beep! beep! right now?" Trigger Happy voiced the question that they all were thinking.

No one answered him. They were all watching the tunnels, waiting for something, anything, to happen.

All at once, the cavern filled with movement as various creatures came pouring from the many tunnels branching away from the entrance. They were all simple minded minions, chompies, grinnades, and such, but they came by the hundred.

"Uh, Spitfire? I think that's more than three hundred," Pop Fizz said worriedly. He took a few steps away from the oncoming swarm and poised to fight. His pose may not have inspired much fear, but at least he was ready to fight.

"There may be a lot of them, but they're just beastlings," Spitfire said. He clenched his fists as the front line drew near.

Thrillipeade shook his head grimly. He'd fought in war before, and this trick was no stranger to him. "This is just the beginning," he warned. "The first wave is the week foot soldiers, set to wear us down a bit. As we get weaker, they'll send stronger opponents."

The millipede's words unnerved him, but Spitfire had no time to ponder them. The battle was upon them.

Trigger Happy and Stealth Elf opened fire, everyone else with long range attacks following their lead.

The first wave of chompies fell, but more replaced them instantly. Their advances slowed but didn't stop. The first grinnades leaped forward and the Skylanders scattered to avoid getting hit. In the moment they took to dodge the grinning bombs, the chompies and spiders surged forward.

* * *

Smash Hit eagerly jumped into the fray. Now it was his turn. He sprinted a little way away from his fellow superchargers, not wanting to accidentally hit them. It had never actually happened, but there'd been a few close calls.

A chompie nipped at his leg and he kicked it away. It got up and ran back to him, greedy eyes locked on his leg. He kicked it away again, this time harder. It flew into Trigger Happy's line of fire and went down. He often marvelled at how chompies, despite their inability to learn, haven't gone extinct.

A spider nipped at his foot cautiously. It was clearly smarter than the chompies, but still not very bright.

Smash Hit knocked it away and lifted his chain. He swung the wrecking ball once above his head to gain momentum, then brought it down in an enormous chain sweep. He spun around a couple of times, getting slightly dizzy. He drew the wrecking ball in and surveyed his work. There was large circle of empty space around him.

He smiled in satisfaction and sprinted off to the next closest thick patch of monsters.

* * *

Thrillipede bit down on the pin and threw his grenade. He added two more into the fray. Behind him Stealth Elf shot down everything in sight, covering what he couldn't get. The rest of the team had fanned out for fighting space. He tossed a grenade into the open maw of a Rhu-Barb and the entire monster exploded.

The mobs of monsters had begun to thin as the Skylanders killed them easily, but they continued to pour in from the tunnels relentlessly. "Where do these things keep coming from!?" Stealth Elf exclaimed in frustration.

* * *

Trigger Happy giggled in delight as some little, scuttling, wooden contraptions were blasted into oblivion. This game of endless targets was fun! Each beastie fell with only a hit or two, and then more would appear! He giggled again as more chompies wandered into his line of fire. He blasted them into oblivion too. For a moment he vaguely wondered why he hadn't seen any sign of a chompy pod. How'd all these chompies get here? Then he got distracted by a spider dropping down in front of him. Laughing hysterically, he chased after it as it tried to run out of his shooting range in terror.

* * *

Dive Clops yanked the grate away from his eye and blasted water at all the beastlings in front of him. He slammed it shut again and hobbled forward on his now clear path. He'd only managed a few steps when a chompie latched onto his ankle. He continued to hop forward while trying to shake the little pest off. It held on with all the jaw-power it had. He grunted with annoyance and shot it off.

Turning back to his path, Dive Clops found that it had already been swamped with new beastlings. He'd been trying to reach one of the tunnels, but it had proved more difficult than he'd expected. The best way to stop a flood was to stop it at the source… if you could reach the source that is.

He waded through the mass of monsters, shooting them out of his way on occasion. Another chompie grabbed onto his metal arm, only to yelp in pain and let go. A long tooth fell to the floor. Dive Clopes grunted in mild amusement, then continued to the nearest tunnel opening. He wasn't far now.

Suddenly Dive Clops heard voices coming from the tunnel. Gruff, ugly voices. He couldn't make out what they were saying, but he didn't need too. Dive Clops felt his heart sink to the bottom of the ocean as hundreds of trolls, greables, cyclopses, imps, drow, togs, and even a few pirates and skeletal warriors burst from the lower tunnels.

Thrillipede was right, there was more to come.

* * *

The foot soldiers moved through the mass of little beasts. Some would stop to shake of the occasional chompy. They weren't as numerous as the beastlings, but there were still a lot of them.

Now this was a fight. Terrafin cracked his knuckles in anticipation. Sure, pounding chompies into pulp was fun and all, but there wasn't very much actual fighting involved.

The first cyclops charged at him with an ax raised above its head. Terrafin punched him square in the jaw and knocked him out.

A sword bearing greeble charged his right flank, yelling a battle cry. Terrafin shot a couple sharks at him. The greeble's war cry became a cry of pain as one mini shark latched onto his large ear.

There was an explosion at his tail, and the shark whipped around to face his attacker. Two trolls were laughing with glee as they lit more dynamite.

Terrafin growled angrily. No one signed his backside and lived to tell the tale. With the possible exception of Trigger Happy.

He jumped up and dove underground. He lept up in between the two trolls and shot one down while punching the other. No sooner than when they fell to the ground that Terrafin felt something stab at his back. He swung his shark launcher around and bashed the drow spearman on the side of his head. This was getting annoying.

Again something grabbed at him. Growling angrily, Terrafin dove underground again, this time to escape the chaos above. He circled for a bit, then burst back into the fight. The first thing he saw was Trigger Happy cannonballing into an unsuspecting greeble. He grinned at the sight.

Trigger Happy giggled delightedly and began blasting coins and fireworks everywhere. Terrafin hurriedly dove underground before he got singed again. Trigg wasn't known for fire safety. Or safety in general.

* * *

Fiesta leaned down to listen to the beckoning ghoul, still focusing on the battle. He had summoned all his bandmates as he fought best with them at his side. That, and the music sounded better.

The blue ghoul spoke quickly to Fiesta in Spanish. While Fiesta was bilingual, his amigos only spoke in Spanish, though they understood English just fine.

"You're right amigo," Fiesta said, straightening. He blasted his trumpet at a few greebles. "I've never seen the Rhu- Barbs beyond the underworld before. And even there they stayed in the deep caves and ruins, no?"

Several of the ghouls nodded in agreement, concern etched on their faces. Fiesta himself was worried about this. Until his amigos mentioned it, he hadn't thought twice about the appearance of Rhu- Barbs. He was used to seeing them on occasion in the underworld. This was the surface though. And they weren't the wandering type of monsters, preferring to stay near their dens. That meant they had to of been transported from the underworld. Only someone from the underworld could do that effectively. Someone powerful.

"I do not like this," Fiesta said bitterly. "I fear we have greatly underestimated this Nightshade. He may be far more powerful than we know." It wasn't just the presence of undead monsters and large armada. There was something deeply unsettling about all of this. The off feeling had been present since landing on the island. There was more to this, more than they knew, more than they could handle.

"We fight a losing battle," he said solemnly. "But fight we will."

* * *

Eruptor was getting really heated. They were everywhere! No matter how many drow he fried, no matter how many pirates he skewered, no matter how many chompies he slashed, they just kept coming! It was the equivalent of fighting rain.

He summoned a mini volcano from the earth in hope of clearing some space. It worked, but only briefly. As soon the fiery outburst cleared the swarm of evildoers refilled the space.

Eruptor swiped his lance through the mob, knocking over larger opponents and vaporizing the little beastlings. No sooner had he completed the stroke when something leaped onto his back, clawing at his shoulders. He channelled his growing anger and raised his body temperature by a hundred degrees. Whatever was on him shrieked in agony and released him, but not without leaving a stinging sensation across his left shoulder and upper back.

He roared furiously and swiped away the greeble attacking from his right. A small cyclops slammed into his stomach, causing his sensitive stomach to regurgitate its contents onto him. Eruptor proceeded to attack in a series of strokes with his lance.

After several more exchanges of blows, his breathing became labored. The forces around him still showed no signs of relenting, yet he was exhausted. He slammed his fist into the ground, sending tremors through the earth. In front of him a fountain of lava sprang forth, spraying everything around it with hot embers. The flowing lava dispersed, but oddly, the tremors continued. Usually the quaking stopped once the lava burst out. Odd.

Eruptor realised that the quaking wasn't coming from him, but something further away. He lifted his head above countless enemies and the other Skylanders to get a better view. The shaking became more noticeable, and friend and foe alike turned their attention to the tunnel opening.

From the tunnels emerged goliaths of all kinds, both animals and weapon bearers. They didn't come in a swarm like the previous two waves had. From what Eruptor could see, there were about fifty to seventy of them. They may not have the advantage of numbers, but even two goliaths were difficult to handle. On a good day.

The fighting resumed, this time with the combined force of the behemoths along with the numerous foot soldiers and smaller beasts. Eruptor found himself wondering how'd they ever get out of this.

* * *

Nightfall dove into her little rift and resurfaced behind the vulture. She slashed at his huge back with her hooks and backed away as he turned and swiped at her with his enormous claws. He roared in fury as he missed her yet again. He charged at her with his claws outstretched, ready to grab anything they came in contact with. Nightfall dove beneath the vulture and resurfaced behind him again. She turned to see him barrel into several greebles and other enemies. She smirked as he blundered about in confusion, searching for his lost prey. The greebles yelled at him angrily, only making the vulture goliath even more confused.

Nightfall had been fighting on the outskirts of the battlefield so she could have a little maneuverability space. The action was thickest and busiest in the center of the cavern and near the tunnels. The flow of newcomers had finally trailed to a trickle, but the numbers remaining still had the upper hand.

Yeah, this was definitely more than three hundred. Nightfall was seething that Spy Rise's apparently 'never wrong' sources had been so wrong. She was gonna have a chat with him and Snapshot once she got back.

A familiar yell caught Nightfall's attention. She turned and quickly scanned through the crowd in search of the source. Not far off, Stormblade was trying to throw a large spider off her back. She was managing to keep it's snapping chelicerae off of her neck, but it left her flanks open to other attackers. That wasn't the real danger though, Nightfall realized. A short distance away from Stormblade, a Spot Bite was crouching low, getting ready to pounce. Stormblade hadn't noticed it yet, being a little occupied with the aggressive spider. If she didn't move soon, she'd be dog chow.

Nightfall moved quickly. She kicked aside the Tussle Sprout attacking her and darted forward. Morphing into a shadow, she raced under the battle and to her struggling friend. Nightfall appeared behind Stormblade and ripped the spider off of her.

"Thanks-" Nightfall shoved Stormblade forward before she could say anything else. The giant, armored, skeleton dog pounced on the spot they had been standing only milliseconds before. All he got was a pawful of dark hair that melted under his claws and some squashed chompies. It looked around it's bony paws as if wondering where its new toys had gone.

"Wow," Stormblade said, stunned. She got up off her back. "I didn't even see that thing. Thanks Nightfall."

Nightfall was panting heavily. She pushed herself off the ground and returned Stormblade's smile, though it was covered by her mask. "Yeah, well, I've got your back Sunshine."

* * *

Smash Hit threw his wrecking ball over his head and slammed it on the ground in front of him, crushing the skeleton. His energy was spent, a feeling rare but not foreign to Smash Hit. He was forcing his body to keep fighting. How much longer he would last, he wasn't sure. Not long.

Wiping the blood and sweat from the right side of his face, Smash Hit hoisted his weapon again. His right hand stung as it came in contact with the metal chain. The same swipe that had marred his face had cut his hand as he'd tried to block the attack.

A couple of Pirate Henchmen charged at him with clubs raised. Three Top-Chops scuttled around them, eager for action. Other creatures of various origins closed around his flanks.

Not far off, Thrillipeade was facing a similar situation. He threw grenades left and right, not stopping for breath or to use a more powerful attack. Beads of sweat trickled on his forehead.

Smash Hit would have to be careful to avoid him. He gripped his chain at the right length and threw the wrecking ball forward. He let the momentum carry and twisted into a large chain sweep. He kept it just close enough so that it would miss Thrillipeade.

Smash Hit spun in a full circle, decimating the criminals. He continued the swing in another loop, and then a third. On the fourth time around, despite his tight grip, the chain, slicked with blood and sweat, slipped from his grasp by a few segments. It wasn't much, but was enough. The spiked wrecking ball slammed into Thrillipede's top right shoulder and threw the millipede to the ground.

Smash Hit froze in horror, letting the wrecking ball roll to a stop and his chain slack. Never, not since childhood, had he slipped. No matter how tired he was, he didn't slip. But he had, and it cost him.

Taking advantage of the warsupial's shocked stillness, the mob swarmed him and dragged him down.

* * *

Paint sprayed across the faces of the Greebles attacking her. Splat twisted her staff and slammed it on the head of one Greeble. In one fluid movement she caught the second Greeble in the stomach and bashed the third on the side of the head.

Breathing heavily, Splat clutched the stitch in her side. Her vision had gone slightly hazy from the blood rushing to her head, and so she rested her weight on her paint staff. She couldn't take much more of this.

Something was approaching her from behind. She didn't really care what. Splat sprung into action and twisted her staff around to hit whatever wished her harm. A troll yelped in surprise at Splat's sudden movement. She finished him in a couple of easy stokes.

Even with those few movements, the pain in her chest flared to full force again. Splat leaned against her staff again in hopes of catching her breath, though she knew her rest would be short lived. Already a Seadog and Arkeyan Knuckleduster were approaching.

An outburst of curses caught Splats attention. Gill Grunt was having some trouble with a Slobber Trap who had clamped down on his trident. More minions clawed at his back in an attempt to subdue him. He was about to be completely overwhelmed.

She had to help him. Splat dodged a swipe from the Seadog's cutlass and sprinted towards the struggling gillman.

All the sudden, something snapped and agonizing pain shot up Splat's leg, causing her to trip and fall. She twisted to see what had done it and found a bear trap clamped down on her left ankle. She reached to pull it off, but something gave a sharp tug at her staff. Splat gripped it tightly as a Cyclops tried to pull it from her grasp. Splat realized how vulnerable she was down on her stomach, but she'd be even more vulnerable if the Cyclops won this game of tug-a-war. Something heavy landed on Splat's back, knocking the wind from her lungs. The Cyclops gave a final yank and ripped the paint staff from her.

As her arms were pulled behind her, Splat saw Gill Grunt being dragged to a similar fate.

* * *

Roller Brawl skidded around a clump of chompies. She liked to fight on the move, slicing at enemies as she sped past. It gave the advantage of not having to directly engage in combat, but it also meant she had to be extra aware of her surroundings. It'd be kinda bad if she collided with someone.

At this point in the battle, Roller Brawl had given up trying to thin the crowd and focused more on keeping the monsters off her friends. It was getting difficult though. She was having to force herself to keep up her momentum. The thick clusters of beastlings wasn't helping either.

Roller Brawl ducked low and reached out with her fang blades to trip a drow elf who was trying to attack Eruptor from behind. She knew she hadn't defeated him, but it would have to be enough. If she stopped it would be hard to get going again. She continued picking of some of the weaker monsters that she could kill in only a couple blows.

The fight wasn't going very well. Roller Brawl was finding it harder and harder to spot her teammates through the thick mass. She tried not to think about it, but she knew that several of them had met defeat. A large metal truck had backed into the cavern from one of the larger tunnel openings. It was like the enemy knew they had already won and only needed to pluck out the last few weeds. It was unnerving.

Roller Brawl drew back her arms and tossed her boomerangs at the back of an imp. As they traveled back around to her, she bashed a few of the chompies by hand. She caught the blades and twisted to skate of to a new section of the fight.

Roller Brawl saw a flash of movement out of the corner of her eye and recognized it as danger to late. The blow hadn't been aimed at her, it was aimed at Pop Fizz. He ducked under the huge sword that would have killed in a direct hit. The sword's momentum carried on and threw the goliath off balance. The flat part of the blade hit her square in the chest with a crack. The wind was knocked from her lungs and she was blown backwards. As soon as she tried to breathe pain flared up in her chest. Roller Brawl was dimly aware that she was being yanked at, but her senses were to confused to make any sense of it.

* * *

High Volt saw the ill aimed sword hit Roller Brawl and knock her to the ground. She was immediately swarmed by some smaller beasts.

High Volt felt a surge of angry energy and cracked his static spear on the head of the skeleton he was fighting, visibly cracking its skull. He surged through the mass with his shield raised, ignoring everything trying to claw at him.

Roller Brawl was curled on the floor while some Cyclops and Greebles were trying to tie her down. High Volt cleared them off with a single electric swipe as if they were nothing. She didn't get up. High Volt couldn't get a closer look as they were being bombarded by several attackers.

While keeping the monsters off of Roller Brawl and himself, High Volt desperately searched the crowd for help. He spotted Astroblast not far off.

"Astro!" he shouted. "Cover me!"

Astroblast saw the problem and began to work his way over as fast as he could. Once he was close enough, High Volt threw his shield over his head and ducked down to get a better look at his hurt friend.

She'd gone very pale, even for her. Her breathing was short and choppy, like she was having trouble drawing a full breath. High Volt could see she was conscious, but her eyes were unfocused.

"She alright?" Astroblast asked without taking his eyes off the fight.

"In shock," High Volt answered shortly. He needed to give her something to focus on to draw her senses back to normal.

He placed a hand on Roller Brawl's shoulder and spoke low and clear so she'd here him over the din. "Just breathe, Roller Brawl," he told her. "Focus on breathing. In and out." At first he wondered if she'd even heard him, then slowly her breath lengthened until she managed a more regular breathing pattern. Her eyes slid back into focus.

"Can you say something?" he asked her.

"Um, ow?"

High Volt relaxed. If she could manage sarcasm, that meant she'd be fine.

"Oh good, you're alive," Astroblast said. He was being kept busy with all the monsters still trying to attack them.

"No, I'm pretty sure I'm still undead." Roller Brawl tried to get up, but High Volt kept his hand in place to stop her.

High Volt looked around the cavern and saw that only a few allies were still fighting. He knew what had to be done, but he didn't like it. "We have to surrender," he growled. The words were vile in his mouth as he said them, but they couldn't keep this up.

"What?!" Astroblast shouted. Never had he ever even imagined yielding when he was still able to fight. He had never backed down before. He looked around at the few fighters who were standing. Although he hated it, he knew deep down that High Volt was right.

High Volt stood up and threw down his shield and static spear. He raised his hands to signal defeat. Roller Brawl followed his lead and placed her boomerangs on top of the shield. Reluctantly, Astroblast added his gun to the pile and raised his hands.

The minions cheered in triumph when they saw the Skylanders proclaim defeat. A Cyclops approached Roller Brawl with cuffs and some others followed. High Volt knocked the Cyclops away from her. He bent down and wrapped his arm around her to help her stand. She didn't complain, which was something High Volt was grateful for. He'd had his fair share of stubborn friends and teammates, Spitfire being one of them.

The effort of standing had left Roller Brawl rather pale, and High Volt wondered if she was hurt worse than she let on. He let her continue to lean her weight against him.

High Volt glared a silent challenge at one of the drow elves. The elf shrugged as if to say "why not." They still made Astroblast wear handcuffs behind his back though.

High Volt scanned the cavern and caught Spitfire's eye. One of the fire demon's metal wings had been twisted in an awkward angle. A silent understanding passed between them, and Spitfire raised his hands high, so that anyone still fighting would see.

Slowly, everyone who was fighting saw his signal and, very reluctantly, surrendered. Most of them gave up their weapons, but Trigger Happy would only relinquish one of his guns. He hugged the other one tightly to his chest like it was a teddy bear and pouted heavily when a Cyclops tried to tug it away from him. He refused to let go of it, no matter how many different minions tried to pry it from him. Finally Spitfire told him to drop it. The gremlin didn't want to disobey a direct order from his leader, so he reluctantly handed it over.

The weapons were all stashed in a large metal box that was chained shut and loaded into the back of the truck. The monstrous mob then guided the skylanders into a large boxy trailer that greatly resembled a jail cell.

High Volt did a quick head count to make sure everyone was here and alive. Most of them were hurt in one way or another, and Smash Hit and Stealth Elf were unconscious, but no one appeared to be mortally wounded.

The metal doors closed with a clang, casting the group in darkness. The engine rumbled to life and they began to move.

"Well, this sucks," Nightfall said.

* * *

 **I warned you, no more sunshine and rainbows. After this chapter, the real story begins.**

 **A special shout out to Tabbyluna who helped me edit this. Be sure to check out her story "No Place Like Home."**

 **Alright, the next chapter will be: The Arena**


	6. Chapter 6, The Arena

The truck jostled as it traveled to wherever it was taking the beaten Skylanders. The inside had stone benches on the sides, which most of them took advantage of. Other than the chained box that contained their weapons, there was nothing in the cart with them. It was an insult to injury to leave their weapons so close, but unable to access them.

It was almost completely dark inside, the only light sources being Spitfire and Astroblast. Everyone was quiet, no one wanting to break the stillness. The weight of defeat had completely subdued them.

From what Spitfire could see, his team had has gone through a very rough fight. Most of them had visible wounds, but the real wound was on their pride. Spitfire had failed them as a leader, but he'd do everything he could to get them out of this mess.

Smash Hit had regained consciousness, that was good. His face had a long cut under his eyepatch and his fur was matted with blood. Stealth Elf was still out of it. Pop Fizz had informed him that she'd taken a hard blow to the head. One of her ears had been torn as well. Splat had her hoof caught in a trap still, but otherwise seemed alright. Terrafin had received a ragged cut down his dorsal fin. The minions had placed a muzzle on him as well as cuffs, apparently afraid of his sharp teeth. The gate that protected Dive Clops' eye was bent and refused to close. Roller Brawl was leaning heavily on High Volt with her eyes closed, but Spitfire knew she was awake. High Volt himself seemed pretty beat, though not badly hurt. Nightfall sat in the shadows next to Elf. Spitfire couldn't tell if she was hurt or not because her dark hair was draped around her. Trigger Happy was pouting, his arms folded across his chest. He and Pop Fizz were left uncuffed, probably because they seemed too small to do any damage without weapons. Thrillipede didn't have any cuffs either. This was partially because his top right arm was dislocated as well as broken, and particularly because the Cyclops were too dumb to figure out how to handcuff three hands. They solved the problem by not cuffing him at all. Gill Grunt had been hit by an ice blast and was still partially frozen. Eruptor was helping him melt the last of the frost. Fiesta had a slash across his back. Spitfire had watched Fiesta get it in order to save one of his ghoul bandmates. Jet Vac's clawed hand had been badly burned. Astroblast was glowering at the floor, but seemed alright other than the customary cuts and bruises that they all had. Stormblade's feathers were ruffled up, but as far as he could see, no major injuries.

Spitfire shifted his arms in an attempt to get in a more comfortable position, but it didn't really help. His mangled wing was hurting, but not too badly because the machinery wasn't actually part of his body. He almost felt guilty that it didn't cause him real pain after seeing the condition of his team.

The truck's jostling slowed as the vehicle came to a stop. The back doors were thrown open, and light poured in. Spitfire winced at the sudden light. Before his eyes could adjusted, he heard jeering laughter and cheers.

A smirking drow elf stood at the open doors. He beckoned them forward. Spitfire stood and followed the elf. Even if he was a failure, he was still their leader. If he led, they would follow.

As he stepped out of the truck and into the light, the cheering increased with delight. He was in what looked like some sort of arena. Before him was a field of sand surrounded by a wall. Raised above the wall were rows and rows of bleachers filled to the brim with cheering occupants of various kinds. Spitfire could make out several drow and Greebles and countless dark wizards. There was a good number of Spell Punks as well. Spitfire then realized that he hadn't seen any of them during the battle. Weird.

Spitfire glanced around him. The sandy area was large and in the shape of an oval. The bleachers ran all the way around it. There was an opening on ether end of the oval. By the looks of it, they had entered from the left and were now in the center facing the long end of the oval. To the right the opening had been closed shut with an ominous barred gate.

There was a sharp jab at his back, and Spitfire stumbled forward. The drow elf continued to prod him forward.

The other Skylanders were dragged out after him. The audience screeched with renewed delight as each of them were brought forward. They were lined up on either side of him. Spitfire winced inwardly as Smash Hit was dragged by the wrists up next to him. The two trolls dropped him face down in the dirt. On his other side, Jet Vac was knocked down to his knees. Spitfire saw a slash on the sky barron's side that he hadn't noticed before.

Thrillipede carried Stealth Elf's limp form to his place in line. He may have one seriously damaged arm, but he still had three good ones. He wasn't going to let the guards near her, that was for sure.

Once all the Skylanders were lined up and facing the audience, a clear voice spoke above the clamor of the crowd. "Well, well. Looky here." In the center of the of stadium, directly above the wall was a wide platform. In the center of the platform was a raised dais with a throne-like chair on it. There were two smaller and less elaborate chairs on each side of the dias. "Eighteen of Eon's most elite Skylanders brought to their knees before me." Nightshade sat smugly on the dais. He was examining a wooden staff that he held in his left hand rather than addressing the Superchargers directly. A black jewel glittered menacingly from its place embedded at the top. "The entire team of Superchargers," he mused. "Well, except for those two stowaways I heard you picked up. Sent them back where they came from, so I hear. To bad, they would have been interesting additions." Nightshade broke his gaze from his staff and looked down at the battle-worn Skylanders. He smiled at them in amusement. "I'm quite pleased that my little trap worked, though I didn't expect such luck as this." He wore his customary mask, but had on more regal clothing than he usually did. A sense of power and command radiated from him.

"Ah, but where are my manners?" Nightshade spread his hands as if talking to welcomed guests. "You must be wondering where you are and why you have been brought before this lovely audience." The stands roared with anticipation.

Spitfire had had enough of this little game that Nightshade seemed to be enjoying. He wasn't going to let him gloat while he sat in silence. "Mmm, no, not really," he said on a slightly bored monotone. "I honestly just want to know where the exit is." This was perfectly true. He really didn't care about what the dark ninja was up to at the moment. He was too concerned about his team.

Nightshade chuckled. "Good to see you have some fire left. You'll need it."

That made Spitfire feel a little uneasy.

"As I was saying," Nightshade continued, "you are in the Frozen Fire Arena, a place built exclusively for illegal, gladiator- style battle brawls. And these here," he gestured to the audience, "are your adoring fans, ready to watch you fight to the death." The crowd's cheering rose up again at the promise of a fight.

A small ruckus by the entrance that the truck had come through drew everybody's attention. A feline- like being that greatly resembled Nightshade was shoving a guard out of his way. He gave the guard a steely glare, then proceeded to enter the arena while twirling a black clubbing-stick on his finger.

Nightshade sighed in slight annoyance, but didn't move to stop him. The feline was noticeably younger than Nightshade, about eighteen or nineteen. His fur was orange-ish brown and he wore black leather. He held a cocky aura as he strode confidently toward the Skylanders.

"These are the fabled oh-so-great Skylanders?" he sneered. "Pathetic. I was hoping for something of a challenge in the ring."

"Yeah, so was I," Astroblast retorted. "Too bad." He was at the end of the line and closest to the feline. Spitfire wished he could smack him, as did half the other senior Superchargers.

The feline glowered at Astroblast, infuriated by the witty insult. He walked up to him angrily. Astroblast met his glare with a steady gaze. The feline struck him across the face with his black club, knocking him to the ground.

Astroblast shifted onto his knees and glared at the feline with deep loathing. There was a mark across his face where the club has hit, and it had broken the skin on his cheek bone. It took all his willpower not to strike back. Any further fight would not end well for him or anyone else. Astroblast forced himself to lower his gaze.

The feline recognized his defeat and relaxed. "That's what I thought," he said. He continued to walk forward through the line, passing Gill Grunt and Trigger Happy without giving them a second glance. He stopped in front of Nightfall, looking at her curiously.

Nightfall raised herself off the ground with her dark hair in a threatening stance. She radiated with foreboding darkness and hidden danger, sending off a clear warning. The fact that she had her hands tied behind her back didn't hinder her menacing appearance.

The feline seemed to get the message and continued down the line without saying anything to her. He glanced at most of them without much interest. He snickered when he saw Terrafin's muzzle and patted him on the nose. Terrafin growled at the feline, showing of rows of pointed teeth, but this only seemed to amuse him further.

Nightshade palmed his brow at the younger feline's behavior, but remained silent.

He stopped again once he reached Spitfire. "And are you supposed to be the leader?" he asked haughtily. "You must feel pretty pathetic if this is what you lead your team into."

Spitfire didn't meet his gaze. The feline's words stung, which surprised him. But it was true, he did feel pretty pathetic after what had happened. The feline gave a slight snicker at the fire demons apparent defeat. Spitfire knew he could put this youngster in his place easy, but he wasn't the one in power right now, so he stayed quiet. The feline gave a slight hmph, as if he'd expected more of a reaction.

He continued walking. The Skylanders bristled as he approached, but he simply ignored them. The feline stopped again in front of High Volt and Roller Brawl. Roller Brawl was still leaning against him for support, but not quite so heavily as before. The feline sneered at her, as if he'd just found easy prey.

High Volt tensed and clenched his fist, ready to defend against the feline if he did something stupid. Roller Brawl merely raised an eyebrow at him, not particularly worried but mildly interested in what he was going to do.

"The little lady tired?" the feline taunted and jabbed at her chest with his stick. He was slammed to the ground faster than the blink of an eye… only it wasn't High Volt who'd punched him.

"Huh, that felt really good," Roller Brawl remarked. She was standing up on her own and rubbing at her gloved knuckles.

Several of the Superchargers chuckled, glad to see the young feline put into place. The stadium roared with laughter, but it was Nightshade himself who was laughing the hardest.

High Volt smirked at the dazed feline laying at his feet. He knelt down and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Kid, lemme tell ya sumthin. That vampire is faster, smarter, and stronger than you could ever hope to be."

"You say vampire?" he asked dizzily. High Volt frowned and thumped him on the head, knocking him out completely.

High Volt stood back up and looked over at his friend. Roller Brawl had gone pale again with the effort of standing, but made no move to gain his support again. "You okay?" he asked her. She nodded, but didn't speak.

"Ah," Nightshade said, recovering from his laugh. "That was the best entertainment we've had all day. Do forgive my nephew, he's still learning his manners. 'Fraid my sister didn't do a very good job of it. Although, by now I would've thought he knew better than to hit a girl. Ah, well. Guess he's figured out the hard way that they usually hit back." Several chuckles from the crowd followed this remark. "Get him outta there," Nightshade waved at a few guards, who obediently dragged the young feline out of the arena.

"Nephew?" Jet Vac prompted. He'd been with the Skylanders for a very long time, but he'd never heard of Nightshade having siblings, let alone a nephew.

"My sister's son," Nightshade clarified. "Elder sister. Not sure about the father. She got herself stuck in jail a while back, so I've been stuck with the brat. He can be surprisingly useful, when he's not pulling off stupid stunts." Nightshade gestured to the Skylanders, classifying their harassment as a 'stupid stunt.'

"Now, I understand you are all quite tired, but before I send you off, I'd like you to know that I have some very special guests who'll be watching tomorrow. So please, be on your best behavior. No conspiring or escape plans, the such." Nightshade spoke as though he were speaking to invited guests rather than prisoners. He turned to a Witch Pitcher nearby. "Show our friends where they'll be staying." He dropped his proper tone and spoke business to the Witch Pitcher, "Front line, separate them by element. Put the odd two together."

The Witch Pitcher gave Nightshade a curt nod and left. He returned to the arena with several guards behind him. They began to prod, shove, and drag the Skylanders to the right side of the arena. The Witch Pitcher, accompanied by two Spell Punks, led them toward the barred gate.

Thrillipede shuddered when he saw that the wall they had their backs to wasn't a wall at all. It was a long row of cages, designed for prisoners to watch whatever ruckus was happening. The cages were connected to form a single piece. The top and backs were solid, while the front and dividers were meshed bars. He didn't see anything in them now, but that did nothing to ease him. He hated cages, though he had a funny feeling that he would encounter several in the near future.

Thrillipede shifted Stealth Elf a little, causing some pain to flare up in his arm. She wasn't going to like the cages very much either. All life Skylanders hated cages.

He caught Jet Vac's eye, who had also been looking at the cages. Distaste was clear in his eyes. They both continued to walk, not wishing to be in this place any longer than they had to.

"Oh, good grief," Nightshade said unexpectedly. "Somebody, get that dumb trap off of her." He gestured to Splat, who had been limping along with the trap still clapped on her ankle. "These are our guests, and will be treated as such. And get rid of that muzzle while you're at it," he added, pointing to Terrafin.

The closest drow and troll bent down and grabbed the trap on Splat's leg. She held still while they pried it open. Normally, she wouldn't accept any form of help from the enemy, but it was causing her enough pain that she no longer cared. She removed her leg as soon as the trap was opened enough for her. Once her leg was clear of the teeth, the drow elf let go of the trap. The trap sprang closed again… on top of the troll's fingers.

Splat clenched her teeth and quickly limped away from the shreking troll. Her hurried escape proved wise as a fight quickly broke out.

It took longer for Terrafin's muzzle to be removed. He growled at the two Cyclops that were nervously approaching him, daring them to do something stupid. One of them grabbed a spear to try to get the muzzle off from safe distance. That was classified as stupid in Terrafin's opinion, so he yanked the spear out of the Cyclop's hands, broke it in half, and threw it back. The Cyclops exchanged a mournful look, knowing they had no other option than to get close to the land shark's jagged teeth.

It took a while for them to actually get it off because they jumped back every time Terrafin moved a muscle. Once they did succeed, both Cyclops bolted. Terrafin thoroughly enjoyed watching how scared of him they were. He gave them a final toothy smirk, then hurried to catch up with his team.

There was the unsettling sound of moving chains and the gate blocking the right exit slowly lifted upward. The Witch Pitcher waited patiently until it came to a complete stop, then continued walking. He hadn't looked over his shoulder once to make sure that the prisoners were following. Not even when the fight between the drow and trolls happened. The lesser minded would be lesser minded, it wasn't his problem to solve. Despite their simpleness, he had complete faith that they would reach their destination without any real trouble. The Skylanders were weak, he could sense it as well as see it. He was powerful. Therefore he was at ease. His Spell Punk companions stood vigilantly beside him, also at complete ease. This place was practically built on Witch Pitcher and Spell Punk magic. Between the three of them, not even the wildest beast would stand a chance of escape.

The Skylanders were led into a dark, slightly curved tunnel. It was considerably colder here compared to the arena, as they were underground on a frozen island. The tunnel was narrow, causing them to walk in single file. The walls were made of dark stone bricks, and if you looked close enough, you could see ancient runes carved into some of them.

They passed at least three doors, but the Witch Pitcher didn't give them a second glance. He continued to walk and the tunnel continued to curve right.

Smash Hit took careful note of all the details. He was good at memorizing a structure's layout, and it might come in handy for smashing this place to bits. Or escaping. That would be alright too, but he personally wanted to see this place in ruins.

The Witch Pitcher stopped all of the sudden. Smash Hit bent down to look under the Witch Pitcher, as he had no hope of looking over him. All he could see through the tangle of legs was a wall. Well that was disappointing.

The Witch Pitcher turned and looked over the Skylanders with a malevolent smile. It was a smirk that gloated "I know something you don't and you're about to find out what, but you aren't going to like it." The Witch Pitcher didn't actually say anything, but it was clear that that was what he was thinking. He turned left and disappeared from sight, along with his Spell Punk companions.

The troll guard behind Spitfire shoved him forward after the Witch Pitcher and Spell Punks. He saw that there was an opening on the left side of the tunnel. He hadn't been able to see it at first because of the dim lighting and the narrow walls. This tunnel was twice as wide, but just as low. Spitfire's heart sank as he turned into it.

"Hey, Dive?" He said over his shoulder. "What was that you were saying about giant underground mazes?"

There were a pair of double doors directly to the right, but the rest of the tunnel had several more tunnels branching away spontaneously. The end of the tunnel was split into a fork.

The Spell Punks were grinning gleefully as the Witch Pitcher continued on his way. He turned left at one of the side tunnels without hesitation. The amounts of twists and turns they took was lost to everyone, including the guards except for the Witch Pitcher, of course. Some tunnels curved, others sloped. After about ten minutes of walking around and getting hopelessly lost, the Witch Pitcher brought them to a set of heavy metal doors. He threw them open effortlessly with magic and walked inside.

It was a prison chamber. A path as wide as the metal doors ran down the center of the chamber with five prison cells on either side, making ten total. They were clearly made to hold no more than two prisoners as they were fairly small cells, about eight feet deep and six feet wide. They were divided by a three foot barrier and bars that ran up to the ceiling. The front of the chambers composed of iron bars that ran to the ground. The doors were also made up of the bars, but they were set in a heavy frame.

The Witch Pitcher snapped some orders at the Spell Punks. They nodded and obediently began to sort out the Skylanders by their element. They began with putting the undead in the far right corner. They then placed the techs in the next cell over, then fire, earth, and life. They started again on the left with magic first, than water, the "odd two"; Astroblast and Nightfall, and finally air. The removed the handcuffs as each Skylander was shoved into their cage.

The Witch Pitcher had occupied himself with opening and relocking cells as the Skylanders were moved into them. He used a single key, and every time he placed the key in a latch, he would mutter an incantation before turning it.

Once all the cages were securely locked, Trigger Happy decided he should ask the question that had been pestering him for the last ten minutes. "What happens if you don't say the magicy wordy thingy?"

The Witch Pitcher looked up and glared at him. For a brief moment he looked as though he wished harm upon the annoying gremlin, but then he broke into an evil grin. He was glad someone had decided to ask that question. In answer, he stuck the key into the lock of the final, empty cell. He then turned to the guards huddled by the entrance.

"You," he said, pointing a long pale finger at a troll. "The ugly green one."

The troll, who had previously been paying no attention to the going-ons, pointed at himself uncertainly with a questioning grunt.

"Yes, you," the Witch Pitcher confirmed with an evil glint in his eye. "Would you do the honor of opening the final cage?"

The troll straightened proudly at the mention of honor and strode up to the door confidently. He grabbed ahold of the key, apparently oblivious that all the Skylanders were already locked away.

"Just give it a good twist," the Witch Pitcher told him, flipping out a pair of sunglasses.

The troll squared his shoulders and gave the key a sharp jerk. There was an immediate bang and a large plume of black smoke. The Spell Punks chortled with delight while the Witch Pitcher grinned malevolently at the unfortunate troll, who was now no more than a pile of black ash.

"That's what happens," he said.

"There goes plan A," Nightfall muttered to herself. It wasn't loud enough for the Witch Pitcher to overhear, which was probably a good thing.

Drow elves proceeded to deposit small kits with basic medical needs and gelled ice packs. The kits only carried the bare minimum necessities to keep them alive. Nothing, other than the ice, to help with pain.

Once the elves had finished their task, the Witch Pitcher went to a rectangular dias built into the wall at the end of the chamber. On the top of the slender dias was what looked like a cone with a glowing orb at the top. The Pitcher flipped a hourglass in the hollowed center of the dias twice.

"Two hours till lights out," was all he said before he, the Spell Punks (who had collected the troll ash in a glass jar for whatever reason), and the guards left. The iron doors shut with a clang behind them, silence following after it.

The series of dramatic events in quick succession had left them all in a bit of shock. They stood silently in their cells, half expecting something else to happen. Nothing did.

Inside each of the cells, there were two small cots that only raised a foot off the ground. They each had a thin mat that wouldn't really add much cushioning, a thin, yet surprisingly clean, blanket, and a dank pillow. Also within each cell was a door on the wall that was later proved to be a miniature bathroom (thank goodness).

Thrillipede was the first to rouse himself, as he had a clear task to do. He carefully shifted Stealth Elf so that he held her with only two arms instead of three. With his free hand, he moved the pillow and blanket aside and took the mat to the other cot, doubling it up. He then gently set the elf down and began to examine her torn ear. It had clearly gotten infected, but that wasn't all too surprising. Thrillipede occupied himself with cleaning the wound and sewing it shut. Unfortunately, there was little he could do for the concussion. That's what he thought at least, until he looked a little closer at the contents of the kit. As it so happened, there was some medicine for her headache, as well as a splint and bandages for his own injury.

There must have been someone observing them for that purpose, he realized. If Nightshade put in the extra effort of making sure they got the appropriate medical supplies, it sent a very clear message. He wanted his Skylanders alive. What wasn't so clear was why. Sure, there was the obvious reason of forcing them to fight in the arena, but while any villain would enjoy that as entertainment, Nightshade wouldn't be content. He was after something more, but what?

Thrillipede new he wouldn't find any answers tonight, so he distracted himself with setting his broken bone. It was one thing to have someone else set a broken bone, but doing it yourself was extremely difficult and unbearably painful. He was fortunate enough to have three arms to work with, so Thrillipede clenched his jaw and set the bone before he could think it through. He gave a strained grunt of pain as he snapped it back into place. He'd had broken bones before, but that didn't mean it hurt any less. Once the worst of it was over, he placed the splint and wrapped the bandages around it to hold the bone in place.

"A little help, Terrafin?" he asked the dirt shark while walking over to the bars. Terrafin gave him a nod, which was all the warning he gave before shoving the millipede's shoulder back in it's socket. "Ow!" Thrillipede shouted, having been less prepared this time. He didn't complain though, it was already feeling way better.

Everyone else began to clean out their own wounds and help out their teammates when necessary.

High Volt motioned Spitfire over to the bars separating them. The fire demon complied and High Volt began to tug and tweak his mangled wing. It was difficult without any proper tools and wouldn't be fully fixed, but it was better than nothing.

Stormblade helped Jet-Vac bandage his burned talon as it was difficult for him to do with only one hand. He had been fortunate enough that it wouldn't cause him any permanent damage.

Pop Fizz carefully examined the contents of a glass jar from his own kit. He was definitely puzzled by it. He gave it a good sniff to be sure. "Huh, it's actually authentic." Pop scratched his furry head. "I don't think it's been tampered with at all."

"May I have it back then?" Splat asked rather impatiently. Pop Fizz had snatched it away when she first picked it up, insisting that he needed to make sure it was safe. He now gave it back to her reluctantly.

"You wouldn't be complaining if there had been something done to it," he grumbled as Splat spread the disinfectant cream over her bleeding ankle.

Roller Brawl cut off the thread, having finished the stitches on Fiesta's back. "All done," she told him.

"Thank you little amiga, that feels much better now," he said sitting up on his bed. She nodded to him and started to stand back up, but staggered with a wince. "Here," he said, holding out his ice pack. She hesitated, so he pressed it into her hands before she could decide that he needed it more. Roller Brawl was usually pretty laid back, but Fiesta had learned the hard way that she could be incredibly stubborn if she set her mind on something. "You need it, hermanita."

She gave him a grateful smile, though it was mostly hidden by her helmet.

Gill Grunt was now completely unfrozen, but he was shivering violently. He'd wrapped himself up with both blankets in an attempt to warm up, but it wasn't really working. He was a tropical fish, not an arctic one.

Dive Clops didn't mind his blanket being taken. Heck, he might as well give Gill the rest of his bed. Not like it would be much use to him.

Astroblast was still pretty ticked off about his scuffle with Nightshade's nephew. He was refusing to treat his wounds, as if leaving them raw was a show of strength.

Nightfall was getting very mad him. "Look, you can go ahead and be an idiot when we aren't in a life or death situation, but for now sit down and hold still or do it yourself!" she growled at him. Despite her temper, Nightfall cared very deeply for her team. She knew that Astroblast was acting out of spite, but that wasn't an excuse for him to let his cuts get infected.

Astroblast glared furiously at Nightfall. What made her think she could boss him around?

"Don't make me knock you out," Nightfall warned him.

Astroblast was about to call it a bluff, but then he realized that she was dead serious. "Fine, but be quick," he snapped.

"Stop sniping at each other," Eruptor ordered from across the cell. "We've got enough problems without you two at each other's throats."

Nightfall and Astroblast gave each other a death glare, but obeyed and didn't say anything else.

Trigger Happy climbed up onto the bars of his cell and began to do what looked like chin-ups, but not really because all the bars were vertical. He had a determined expression set on his face.

"Uh, what's he doing?" Stormblade asked while watching the gremlin with interest.

"H-he's b-b-been wh-watching t-t-t-to m-many m-movies," Gill Grunt stuttered through chattering teeth.

Stormblade nodded, needing no further explanation or detail.

Just then, the orb that was their source of light dimmed for a moment, then returned to it's usual glow to mark the passing of an hour.

"That's as good as she's gonna get." High Volt released Spitfire's metal wing. The fire spirit nodded with gratitude.

Not long after, a young drow elf entered the chamber, unaccompanied. He carted platters of food and water bottles while holding a small spear. The food was nothing special, but better than what prisons usually served. It was just meat and cheese sandwiches.

The elf was clearly nervous. He didn't meet anyones eyes as he served the food. The Skylanders remained still and silent as they watched him… mostly.

When the young elf approached the tech's cage, Trigger Happy strutted up to the bars wearing a practiced scowl. He crossed his arms and lifted his chin while looking down his nose in what he thought was an intimidating pose, but the whole effect was ruined by the fact that he was a short little gremlin.

It was enough to unnerve the kid apparently. He began to uncertainly push the food through the bars, but jumped back and flattened his ears when Trigger Happy let out a sort of growl.

High Volt sighed and rolled his eyes, then grabbed Trigger Happy by the scruff and tossed him onto one of the beds. The orange gremlin burst into hysterical laughs, no longer able to keep up the act.

"L-like I said, t-t-to many m-movies," Gill Grunt said.

"Well then you're grounded," Spitfire told Trigg.

"No I'm not, I'm in the air!" He declared with more giggles as he bounced on the bed, despite the lack of spring.

The drow elf hurried with his job after that and basically sprinted out the door when he finished, dragging his trolley after him.

"I almost feel bad for him," Stormblade said sympathetically. "I wonder if he even realizes he's working for the darkness. He may have been told some lie or another."

"Of course you would think that," Nightfall scathingly said. "Because it would never occur to you that he just made his choice to join the darkness," she mocked.

"Don't you two dare start up again," Spitfire warned.

Dive Clops nodded in agreement. "There are more important things to be discussed right now."

"I want to know what Nightshade is really up to," Thrillipede said.

"Si," Fiesta agreed. "It is a dangerous game Nightshade is playing, but he is hardly a foolish villano."

Spitfire shook his head. "I want answers as much as you guys, but we aren't gonna get any tonight. We've all had a rough day, so just rest for tonight. We'll see what happens tomorrow, and maybe then we can work this out. Now everybody go to sleep."

* * *

It was late and the light orb had long since went out. The pain in his back had flared up and woken Fiesta. He must have shifted and irritated it on accident, he figured. The skeletal ghoul lifted his party hat off his face and was surprised to see Roller Brawl still up. She was leaning against the bars of the cage, staring off into space.

"Shouldn't you be sleeping, amiga?" Fiesta ashed her.

Roller Brawl jumped slightly at the sudden noise, but relaxed as she saw Fiesta awake. "I'm naturally nocturnal," she said.

"That is a really lame excuses," he told her.

"Eh, I'm not feeling very creative right now," she shrugged.

Fiesta smiled in amusement. "Why are you awake, Roller Brawl," he asked again.

She looked down while slowly rolling one of her skates back and forth. "I can't sleep," was all she said.

Fiesta had a feeling she could if she tried, but he wasn't going to press it any further. Fiesta pulled his hat back over his eyes and fell asleep again.

* * *

 **Next chapter: Fluorescent Fight**


	7. Chapter 7, Let The Games Begin

**Well, there's good news and bad news. The good news is: I'm alive! The bad news is: you all probably want to kill me. I honestly don't blame you either. It's been _two months_. I had a very chaotic life after the last chapter and was unable to write at all for weeks at a time. There were various things that happened, (nothing bad) that simply didn't allow the time. **

**Again, I split the chapter because it was taking so long for me to get this up. So the _Next_ chapter will be called Fluorescent Fight. **

**Guest: I feel really guilty about this taking so long right after you asked me to update faster. I'll get the next chapter out ASAP just for you.**

 **Just so you all know, I WILL NEVER EVER ABANDON A STORY!**

 **Thank you all for being so patient! I hope this chapter was worth the wait.**

* * *

Morning had come, or at least everyone assumed that it was morning. No one had a way of actually telling, as sunlight was a distant memory... and their watches had been confiscated. Nearly everyone had woken up, but no one talked much. Not even Trigger Happy.

Stealth Elf had remained completely unconscious throughout the night, which was worrying. She'd been know to sleep through earth shattering thunderstorms (yet never a snore-storm), but remaining unconscious for this long after a battle usually wasn't a good thing.

The Skylanders were left undisturbed for a long time. At some point a drow elf, different from the one yesterday, delivered breakfast, but that was the only sign of any guards they'd had. Hours passed in near silence. They all knew sometng was going to happen and the long wait made them more tense by the minute.

It wasn't until around what they assumed was noon that the heavy, metal doors that sealed the Skylanders into the chamber were thrown open, revealing a Witch Pitcher and several guards. The Witch Pitcher spoke to the guards without shifting his gaze. "The dreadwalker and the, uh, the-uh, him." He pointed to High Volt. "I'm not really sure what he is."

The troll guards obediently moved to the cooperative cells and stood on either side of the doors. The heads of their spears bristled with electricity and were held ready to strike. As the Pitcher approached Nightfall's cage, a few of the guards stuck their spears through the bars to keep Astroblast at a safe distance. Nightfall silently allowed them to cuff her and was led out of the chamber. The same was done with High Volt, and all the guards and the Witch Pitcher left with.

* * *

Nightfall calmly walked in between the troll guards and behind the Witch Pitcher, who had teleported himself to the front of the charge. She mentally cursed her heart, which was beating way faster than it should be. She couldn't help it. She would never say it out loud, or heaven forbid show it, but she was scared. Heck, she was terrified. Being singled out by the enemy was nerve rattling. What did they want with her and not the rest?

Nightfall was also secretly glad that High Volt had been singled out with her. Maybe it was selfish, but she was glad she wouldn't have to meet her fate alone.

They were led back into the narrow hall that they had been led through the night before. "In here," The Witch Pitcher commanded while opening one of the doors along the wall. Nightfall was shoved forward and the door slammed shut behind her.

* * *

Spitfire looked up as the chamber door was opened again. He narrowed his eyes at the Witch Pitcher and Spell Punks that entered. These were the same from the night before. He was sure of it. He was also sure that he would be seeing a lot more of them. The Pitcher that had come for High Volt and Nightfall had been less confident in comparison, as this Pitcher radiated authority and command.

The Witch Pitcher spread his hands in a fake gesture of friendliness. "You have all been, invited, by Nightshade himself to attend tonight's show. He requests that you all be on your best behavior for his special guests," he said mockingly. The Witch Pitcher's Spell Punk companions snickered nastily behind him.

Spitfire's frown deepened. He remembered Nightshade mentioning something about 'special guests' yesterday. He had a sneaking suspicion that knowing who these guests were would lead them one step closer to solving at least one of the riddles they had recently encountered.

"Let's move," the Pitcher said coldly, drawing Spitfire's attention back to the situation at hand. Obediently, the two Spell Punks moved to the first cell with a key. As each Skylander was released they were re-cuffed and escorted out by two troll guards. None of them spoke or showed resistance, although there were a few hateful glares.

"What about that one?" a Spell Punk asked when they had reached the final cage. Trolls had already escorted Thrillipede out, so Stealth Elf was the only Skylander remaining.

The Witch Pitcher looked over his shoulder, as he had already begun to leave. "Leave her. It'd be pointless to drag her back and forth if she isn't even awake to spectate the show." He left without another word, and the Punks followed.

The Skylanders were led through the maze once again, but this time the walk felt much shorter. They couldn't tell if it was because they were no longer exhausted or because they took a shorter route. They were led to the entrance of the maze, but instead of turning right and into the tunnel that they had been lead through before, the guards guided them through the double doors near the tunnel's entrance.

Once they were let in, it became clear that they were on the opposite side of the cages that lined one side of the arena. The room was long and hall-like with very plain stone walls. It would have been rectangular if not for the bowed-in wall lined with heavy metal doors.

The Skylanders were pushed and locked into each cage at random.

Within the arena, a forest elf cowered under the shadow of a sky pirate. He held his spear up shakily, knowing it would do little to protect him. He'd already been beaten pretty badly. The only reason he was still standing was because the feathered pirate took pleasure in toying with him, watching him scurry away as the hope drained from his eyes.

The crow stepped forward, a dark smile curling onto his beak. The elf stepped back, limping on a twisted ankle. His ears drew backwards as the bird continued to advance. He kept shuffling backwards until his back pressed against something solid. He'd reached the wall. Nowhere left to run.

In a sudden flash, the black bird lunged forward and slashed the spear away with his bare talons. Trapped and defenceless, the forest elf shrank back, his breathing coming in panicked gasps. The pirate raised his blade, but froze with it raised above him. He cocked head toward Nightshade, as if to ask permission. The dark cat inclined his head towards him, indicating his approval. With a malicious grin, he drove his scimitar downwards.

Cheering bellows arose from the stands, delighted by the kill. But Nightshade wasn't watching the crow and elf. No, he was watching the Skylanders. Several of them either closed their eyes or turned away from the scene. The rest looked infuriated by the act. A certain fire demon gave no outright reaction, like Nightshade had hoped. Instead, Spitfire met Nightshade's eyes with an internal fury. His expression spoke a clear message: You will pay for this.

"Well that was boring." Nightshade redirected his attention to his skeletal guest. Count Moneybone was lounging in the 'honored guest throne' to the feline's right. "I thought you said that this place provided good entertainment," he complained.

"Oh it will," Nightshade assured him. "This little scuffle was merely a warmup, something to pass the time until the real show can begin." Nightshade wasn't particularly fond of Moneybone, as the high-standard bag of bones constantly got on his nerves. But he needed him, so he could put up with it for now.

Nightshade raised his voice to address the crowd as the arena below was cleared out. "Before we begin the evening games," the chatter dimmed and heads turned to listen to their host, "I would like to welcome our honored guest, Count Moneybone." There was a respectful applause from the audience that lacked any real energy. "Unfortunately," he continued, " our other guest has been delayed, and will not be joining us in tonight's games."

"Now, as you are all aware, the Frozen Fire Arena, as well as the rest of the S.U.R.G.E. network, has been going through some... rough times." There were several murmurs of agreement. "With the rise of Master Eon and his Skylanders, along with most of Skyland's greatest villains either captured, reformed, or retired, we can no longer find worthy competitors. However, with change also comes some new opportunities. I promised to regain Frozen Fire's former glory, and today I will deliver on that promise. I have done what no other king has done, what no other arena has dared to try." He looked down to where the Skylanders watched him. "I have captured, at great cost I might add, a team of Skylanders! The elite Superchargers!" The crowd cheered enthusiastically. The presence of the Skylanders had previously gone unnoticed due to the action within the ring.

"All of them?" Count Moneybone bolted upright in his chair. Without waiting for an answer, he demanded, "Where is Fiesta!" Even as he said it, his eyes locked down on his nemesis. He glared at the musician with all the hatred he had. "I want to see him suffer," he growled.

"Mmmm, I was thinking more along the lines of 'I want to see him perform some music," Nightshade admitted. "But I suppose some suffering could be arranged."

"See to it." Moneybone sat back in the throne with a heavy pout, his eyes still lingering on the Skylander below.

"Anyway," Nightshade continued dismissively, "I have arranged two battles for this evening, both of which we have never seen the likes of before. So without further ado, let us begin!"

The rattling of heavy chains drew everyone's attention to the end of the arena. The gate barricading the dungeon maze was being drawn upwards. High Volt walked into the sandy pit. He'd reacquired his shield and spear, but they hung relaxed against his sides. He calmly took in the scene before him.

"I've often wondered, how many minions can a single Skylander fell? Well, let's find out."

The opposite gate began to clatter as it opened.

"All the minions you will be facing are voluntary troops," Nightshade told High Volt. "So all you have to do, Skylander, is survive them."

The first opponents charged through the gate, two spear cyclops. The tech Skylander remained impassive as they ran straight at him. He calmly sidestepped the first one, whose momentum drove him into the wall, knocking him out. High Volt grabbed the other cyclops's spear right before it hit his chest and swiftly thwacked him on the head with his own spear.

Three Pirate Henchmen were the next competitors to enter, along with a few chompies trailing after them. Two of the henchmen stayed back to attack from a distance while the third charged ahead. High Volt lazily grabbed him by the tentacles and threw him into one of his comrades. He sidestepped the grappling hook of the third henchman and then blasted him with electricity. He went ahead and zapped a couple of the chompies as well, but decided to ignore the one vainly gnawing at his armored boot.

Nightshade frowned from where he was watching the action. The Skylander wasn't putting on much of a show. And it was intentional too. That had to change, but he'd wait another push before changing the game.

On cue, an Armored Lance Master and a Trollverine entered the ring. They smartly split apart to attack the skylander from opposite directions. High Volt saw what they were trying to do, and he was ready for them.

The drow ran at him from the right while the Trollverine approached his left. High Volt waited until the last second before he twisted, ducked, and held his shield in front of him with his spear positioned behind him. The Trollverine was immediately impaled while the Lance Master simultaneously bounced off the heavy shield. High Volt flung the troll's corps off his spear and toward the elf. The elf had already regained his balance and easily dodged his former companion, but, thinking fast, High Volt kicked the chompie still attacking his feet. The elf squeaked in surprise as it landed on his face. Using the distraction, High Volt blasted the spear out of the elf's hand. Now defenceless, the Lance Master backed away from the skylander, afraid that he would soon end up like the Trollverine. But High Volt made no advances on him. Instead, the tech Skylander relaxed his stance.

The elf glanced up at Nightshade nervously, unsure of what to do. He was supposed to be throwing everything he had at the Skylander, but that would be suicide without his weapon...and right now his spear was at the feet of the Skylander. Fleeing would probably end worse for him than fighting, as it would destroy his honor and likely end with him being executed, or worse.

Making up his mind, the Lance Master charged towards High Volt as if he were going to attack. At the last moment he ducked to grab his weapon… only to slam into a metal shield. Again. He shook his head to clear the ringing.

High Volt watched, slightly amused at the drow's attempt to grab the lance. The elf tried again, using a different method, but High Volt threw him back just,as easily.

Now the elf was getting seriously annoyed. He tried again, expecting to meet the shield again, but this time ended up with a mouthful of dirt instead as he tripped over the static spear.

"Stop, stop, stop," Nightshade said with his hands raised. He was fed up with High Volt's refusal to cooperate. "This is not nearly as entertaining as it should be. Or could be," he added with a growl. "It appears," he said loudly to draw everyone's attention, "that our Skylander needs a little motivation."

He gave a signal. The last murmurs silenced as everyone waited to see what Nightshade had in store. The seconds ticked, and finally someone new was guided into the arena. Literally. A tiny fox kit who could be no older than two was holding the hand of a drow witch as she led him in. The kit looked around in wonder, completely oblivious to the danger around him.

High Volt scowled, not liking where this was heading.

The witch shook the kit off, causing him to look at her in slight confusion. The drow made her leave quickly, clearly unhappy about being assigned 'babysitter.' The kit wasn't bothered by this. He continued to dreamily examine his surroundings.

"Resume the game," Nightshade commanded without warning.

Immediately, a new set of troops stormed into the ring. Spotting the kit, they went directly for him. The kit noticed the newcomers coming toward him, but didn't move. He was curious about what game they were playing. Someone had said game.

High Volt wasted no time in jumping in front of the kit, who gave a little start. He knocked out the closest opponent with the static spear and scooped up the kit with his left hand. His hand was large enough and the kit small enough that it could easily be held with just one hand.

Using the tech Skylander's distraction, the Lance Master dashed to his lance. High Volt proceeded to dispose of the the brutes in front of him, seemingly unaware of the elf creeping up behind him. The kit 'ohhed' and watched wide eyed when High Volt blasted the final attacker with an electrical surge. He leaned forward and reach for the spear, but was too far away to touch it.

The drow charged, believing that the Skylander was unaware of his presence. Swiftly, High Volt tossed the kit to his other hand, twisted around, and blocked the elf with his shield. For the fourth time the Lance Master stumbled back dizzily after impact. High Volt tossed the kit to his other hand again and clubbed the elf before he had a chance to attack again.

The kit was giggling happily at the sudden rush of movement. This was fun! He liked this game.

Before High Volt had a chance to catch his breath, the next wave was attacking. A Slobber Trap and several trolls. The Slobber Trap led the charge and bounded toward the Skylander. He needed both hands to be able to fight this hoard off. He needed a way to safely occupy the kit.

High Volt went with the first idea that came to mind. It was risky, very risky, but he didn't really have many options.

Once the Slobber Trap was close enough, High Volt directed a carefully aimed bolt of electricity into it's eyes, temporarily blinding it. The Slobber Trap halted in surprise and confusion. Acting quickly, High Volt placed the kit on top of it's grassy head.

"Hold on tight," he told the kit sternly.

"Okay!" the kit nodded happily in response. He wrapped his tiny fingers around the grass and flower, wondering what game this was going to be!

As High Volt ran off to fight the trolls, the Slobber Trap shook himself to clear his vision. Spotting the Skylander, he began to run in that direction, but stopped when he realised something was off. Did his head feel heavier? He hadn't eaten that many chompies, had he? Then something giggled from above him. Huh? He twisted his head to see what it was, but to no avail.

The Kit laughed uncontrollably as the Slobber Trap swerved his head this way and that, trying to see what was on his head.

Meanwhile, High Volt was occupied with the trolls. He put a lot more energy into attacking his opponents (literally), attacking first to keep their attention away from the kit and baffled Slobber Trap.

It was just as High Volt felled the final troll that the Slobber Trap decided that he didn't want whatever was on his head on his head anymore. He began to thrash his head around in attempt to fling it off.

The kit held on tightly, knowing that holding on was the way to win this game. The weird-looking lightning person said so. He dug his small fingers deeper into the beast's grassy ruff for a better grip.

Realizing that it wasn't working, the Slobber Trap went from thrashing to bucking. He was highly annoyed at this point. With a sudden rrrip, the Slobber Trap finally managed to throw the kit off… along with half of his main.

"Wheeeeeee!" the kit cheered happily as he soared through the air with a fistfull of grass and a flower. This was even more fun!

High Volt raced to catch the kit, electrifying the sense out of the Slobber Trap as he went by. He barely managed to catch the kit before he hit the ground.

"Again! Again!" the kit cheered. He clapped his hands excitedly and wore a big grin, totally oblivious to how close he had been to dying. He'd dropped most of the grass, but kept the flower. It was pretty!

"Maybe later," High Volt panted.

Wave after wave of troops were sent into the arena, and wave after wave were defeated. Most of the competitors were only melee troops, so on their own they weren't much of a challenge. High Volt had managed to keep both himself and the kit unscathed, but only just in several occasions.

The kit was fascinated by the static spear, all those sudden flashes and sparks! He really wanted to touch it. If only he could reach…

While High Volt was occupied blocking the ferocious slashes of a Rhu-barb, the kit saw his chance and took. He leaned over with his hand outstretched and… Zap!

High Volt looked down to find that the kit's fur was sticking out in every direction, kinda like Scratch's does every time Hot Dog startles her awake. He wasn't crying, thankfully, but the kit did give High Volt a very unhappy look.

"Well, you touched it," High Volt said in his defense.

As the battle continued, High Volt slowly began to show signs of tiring. He shifted from offence to defense more quickly and took longer to knock out each wave. He breathed heavily as he sized up a trio of spear cyclops. They may not be bright, but they were smart enough to split apart so that he couldn't block all of them at once. They charged simultaneously.

High Volt jumped forward to block the cyclops directly in front of him, who bounced back. Spinning around to face the other two, he drove the static spear into the ground, causing electrifying sparks to spring off in every direction. Most of the shock wave was absorbed into the ground and then back out to the two spearmen, electrocuting them where they stood. It was enough to slow them down, but not quite kill them.

Before they could fully recover, High Volt clubbed the left one and moved to do the same to the other one. He wasn't quite fast enough and the cyclops dodged his attack. The cyclops jabbed at him. Holding the kit out of harm's way, High Volt knocked the spear aside with his own. Before the cyclopes could attack again, High Volt stabbed him in the chest.

No sooner than the cyclops fell, High Volt heard a small cry of surprise. Whipping around, he saw that there was a small scratch on the kit's cheek. It was a very shallow and clean cut and would barely leave a scar, but still.

The kit had a shocked expression on his face, not fully understanding what had just happened. As the pain began to register, the kit's face scrunched up and he started crying. This game wasn't fun anymore. He wanted it to stop. He wanted the bad feeling to stop even more. Why wouldn't it stop? He began to cry even harder.

The cyclops who had done the deed was also surprised. Throughout the whole battle, no one had managed to lay a finger on the kit. He was the first to succeed. The cyclops was starting to feel kinda proud. That is, until he caught the death glare High Volt was giving him. He barely had time to think 'Uh-oh' before an armored fist slammed into his eye.

"Well," Nightshade said. "It appears that I'm all out of volunteers," he mused. "I guess I underestimated how protective over innocents you Skylanders can be."

High Volt glared daggers at Nightshade, not finding this very amusing. He honestly wished he could strangle the cat on the spot. Unfortunately, he was a little occupied with trying to calm the kit down.

"Anyway, bravo and all that," Nightshade continued. The crowd was mostly grumbling about the battle's end. While it had been a truly spectacular performance, they had wanted to see the Skylander's defeat. He needed to move things along to keep them happy. "You are now free to join your friends to watch tonight's main event. After of course, a brief intermission."

High Volt got the feeling he didn't actually have a choice in the matter. Some guards and the drow witch that had led the kit into the arena approached him. The witch moved to take the kit back, but High Volt wouldn't let her.

"I keep the kit," he said firmly.

"Excuse me?" Nightshade questioned.

"I won the battle. I keep the kit," High Volt repeated.

Nightshade thought this over. "I guess than would be fair," he said slowly. "And it would save me the trouble of caring for it… Very well," he decided. "You may keep it. The brat was more trouble than he was worth anyway."

With that, the guards escorted High Volt back to the other Sylanders, minus a very relieved drow witch. It wasn't until he was in a cell that he managed to get a good look at the fox kit.

The Kit was darkish-brown in color with lighter colored paws and underbelly. He had large light blue eyes. He was still crying pretty hard, the fur on his cheeks wet with tears.

The truth was, High Volt had no idea how to actually care for a kid, let alone make it stop crying. "Um, a little help?" he asked the others. He mostly looked to the female Skylanders for support, as the other boys looked as helpless about the matter as he felt.

"Aww, he's so cute," Stormblade cooed.

"Then you take him," High Volt offered.

"Um…" Stormblade said, suddenly doubtful. "Not that I wouldn't love to, but…"

"Give him to me," Splat said. "I have some experience with small children," she added.

The kit was small enough to fit through the bars, and was passed down to the fawn. She wasted no time in trying to calm him down.

"Aww, dose that scratch hurt?" she asked sympathetically. She gently bounced him to calm him.

The kit sniffed and nodded. He hadn't stopped crying, but he was calming down a little. He liked this new fuzzy pink person.

"Well guess what," Splat said. "You see that big scary fire demon?" She pointed to Spitfire, who was in the cage next to her.

The kit nodded again. He'd reduced his crying to sniffles as curiosity to hold.

"Well, he also cries when he gets owies," Splat told him.

"Excuse me?"

"Really?" the kit asked, feeling a little braver.

"Really," Splat nodded. "Every time." She tried to maintain a sincere expression, but a grin was threatening to break out.

"I do not!" Spitfire protested.

Splat shot him a quick smile. "Even big tough Skylanders cry sometimes," she continued to explain. "So I guess you must also be big and tough."

The kit smiled a little at being called tough. He tried extra hard to cover his sniffles to prove he was strong.

"Well look at that," Splat acted amazed. "You stopped crying even faster than Spitfire can, and he's a full grown Skylander!"

The kit giggled in response.

"Okay, this is so not fair." Spitfire turned to the others. "Are none of you going to defend your leader?" He found that most of them were trying, and failing, to cover their own giggles.

"Whatever works, amigo," Fiesta said. He pointed to the kit, who was now happily laughing in Splat's arms.

"I'll get you for this," he promised her, but a smile had crept onto his lips.

Nightshades voice rang out across the stadium, drawing the Skylanders' focus back to the arena. "Now is the moment you all have been waiting for," he addressed the crowd. "A battle never seen before. A battle that will go down in history. A battle, where darkness meets darkness!"

* * *

 **Alright, the next chapter will be Fluorescent Fight. I promise.**


	8. Chapter 8, Fluorescent Fight

Nightfall was thrust into the arena. She shook off her captors with an angry growl, not liking being touched. She looked up to where Nightshade stood as he began to speak to the spectators, including her fellow Skylanders, she realized, spotting them. _Why is Splat holding a fox toddler_? She thought in confusion.

"Tonight," Nightshade said, "the dark Skylander known as Nightfall will battle against my champion and nephew, Cosmo!" The audience roared in approval.

The sound of a metal gate opening drew Nightfall's attention to the opposite end of the Arena. The cocky young feline that had 'welcomed' them into the arena last night strode in, tall and proud. He wore a black and red armored vest over a black shirt and black pants. He wielded a curved scimitar. When he spotted Nightfall, he scowled.

"She's not the one I want to fight," he growled to Nightshade.

Nightshade looked genuinely confused for a moment, but then his eyes widened in realization. He laughed out loud. "I see, you wish to regain your honor," he said, amused. "But there is no honor, nephew, in defeating a girl who can hardly stand," he smirked. "Not only that, but you are not in the right to seek revenge," he pointed out. "Yes, you were humiliated in front of hundreds of people, but it was _you_ who provoked her. The way I see it, everything is even."

Cosmo scowled at his uncle, but didn't say anything else. Nightshade had made a point.

"I feel like I've missed something," Count Moneybone said. "What are you talking about?" He had been asleep in his apartment the night before when the Skylanders had arrived.

"Cosmo was punched by a girl in front of hundreds of people," Nightshade said simply.

Moneybone needed no further explanation.

"And now, without further ado, Lights Out!" As Nightshade's voice rang out across the stadium, the whole arena was plunged into near darkness. Only special lights that barely shone lined the edges of the ring. They caused special fluorescent paint rimming the clothes of both fighters that had previously been unnoticable to light up.

Nightfall glowed blue. The edges of her vest, the seams and ruffs on her pants, the edges of her boots, and the tips of her hooks had all been illuminated. There were also a few shimmers of blue in her hair. Along with the blue paint, Nightfall's eyes also glowed brightly, which is why she didn't have any paint on her face.

Cosmo, on the other hand, glowed with red paint. His was done similarly to Nightfall's, but some of the patterns on his vest had also been outlined. Because his eyes didn't glow, he also had paint under his eyes and on the tips of his pointed ears. The razor edges of his sword also glowed like fire.

The effect of the fluorescent lights made it impossible to see the non-illuminated parts of the fighters. As well as the arena. And everything else.

"Fight!" Nightshade called out once his eyes adjusted to the darkness. "And remember Cosmo," he said as he sat down in his throne, "If you strike a girl, she will strike back."

With those final words, Cosmo turned to face his opponent… only she wasn't there. Desperately, he searched the darkness for the nightmare. His eyes only fell on more darkness, but his sharp ears did pick up on something. He whirled around, and blocked two illuminated hooks, just inches from his face. He locked eyes with Nightfall in an unspoken challenge. This was his chance to prove to his uncle that he _could_ defeat a Skylander.

Nightfall narrowed her eyes at the feline. "You play a dangerous game," she warned. She pushed at him, propelling them both back. "For I am the darkest mystery you will _ever_ find!-" Nightfall slashed at him and then dashed underneath him. Cosmo was quick to act. He managed to block the first attack and then lock blades as she appeared behind him. "-But you will _never_ unfold _me_!" Their faces were only inches apart. Nightfall could see Cosmo's confidence waver slightly.

Inspiring fear on an opponent wasn't exactly a popular method among Skylanders, but being from the dark element made it acceptable for her. Most people have never even heard of a deadwalker, so she already had a frightful edge.

Not wanting to remain on the defensive, Cosmo attempted to knee Nightfall. She backed away before it made contact, but that was all he needed. He swung his sword, and Nightfall jumped back before the blade could slice her chest.

They began to circle each other, waiting to see what their opponent would do. Nightfall appeared to be hovering a foot off the ground as she slowly moved to the left. She knew better than to make the first move. And it was clear that this young feline had very little patience. Cosmo crouched low with his sword raised, searching for a weak spot in Nightfall's defence.

In a sudden flash of red, Cosmo lunged for Nightfall, but his scimitar only sliced through air. He turned, expecting the dreadwalker to appear behind him as she had done before, but again was met with only darkness. All of the sudden, Cosmo was thrown into the air by something beneath him.

In a blue blur, Nightfall jumped up and slashed downward with both her hook and hair. Having been caught off guard, Cosmo wasn't quick enough to react this time. Nightfall slammed him to the ground.

Cosmo felt pain explode along his upper right arm where Nightfall's hook had made contact. It stung way more than it should, as the cut wasn't dreadfully deap. _Venom_ , he realized. The dreadwalker's hair was toxic.

Nightfall backed away, allowing Cosmo to get back up. He gave her a glare of loathing. _It was your own fault,_ Nightfall thought in amusement, but she kept silent. Taunting her opponent would make her no better than he was. It could also spark his anger and determination even more. Silence was often the best tool to use; it could be very unnerving. Especially in her case.

Cosmo was a little confused. Why had the Skylander let him get back up? Why hadn't she dealt more blows? He glanced at where she stood waiting. _She's toying with me_ , he decided. What other explanation was there? Cautiously, he stood back up. He expected her to pounce at any moment. But she didn't. Once he had regained a fighting stance, she gave him a curt nod. Cosmo didn't know what to make of this behavior. The Skylander hadn't been lying when she claimed to be a mystery.

Nightfall could tell that Cosmo had obtained a new level of caution. And not because of her small victory, based on the way he watched her with uncertainty. _Nightshade may often speak about honor, but Cosmo's never seen honor on the battlefield before,_ she though curiously.

Cosmo lunged at Nightfall again, but paid more attention to where she would go. Instead of shadow-dashing, Nightfall jumped off to the side and slashed at his open flank. Cosmo blocked the attack, sparks flashing where the weapons met.

"You're not the only one with dark magic," Cosmo hissed at her with a sneer and jumped back to gain some space. Holding his scimitar upright, he closed his eyes and concentrated. Suddenly, there were three Cosmos standing in the arena, all glowing with bright red markings.

Nightfall's eyes darted between the three Cosmos, trying to differentiate the clones from the real one. The red light obscured all the details in their features, though, and she didn't have time to make up her mind. There was no doubt that the clones could do as much damage as the original, and they were closing in on her.

Nightfall lunged at the closest one and it swiped his sword at her. Expecting this, she ducked down and slashed at his exposed belly. As soon as they made contact, Nightfall found herself ripping through mist. A clone then.

As soon the clone had evaporated, another Cosmo lunged for her. Due to her awkward positioning, Nightfall couldn't block or dodge the attack, so she tried to shadow-dash away. She wasn't fast enough.

Nightfall staggered as she reformed a couple yards away. Saying nothing, she reached down and felt the gash just below her left ribcage. Blood glistened on her glove when she drew her hand away. The cut was deep, but not threatening. Ignoring the searing pain, Nightfall turned to face her opponents.

This time, Nightfall could see a clear difference between the two. While one remained impassive, the other had a slightly surprised, a little prideful, and definitely more confident grin. Apparently Cosmo hadn't expected to actually land a blow. _It won't happen again,_ Nightfall thought sourly. Focusing her own dark magic onto her weapons, Nightfall's hooks split apart to form double blades, giving them a more claw-like appearance. The feline's smirk dropped away immediately.

Using her new edge, Nightfall attacked Cosmo directly. Again and again, Nightfall slashed at the cat, giving him no time to make more copycats. The remaining clone had already faded away, so it was just the two fighting again.

Reds and blues flashed as the dreadwalker and feline exchanged close ranged attacks. The battle became a confusing blur of color to most of the onlookers. Only those with sharp eyes and night vision could make out the details.

Realising that she couldn't break through his defense, Nightfall punctured ground with her hair and attempted to throw Cosmo into the air again, or at least make him lose balance.

Not one to fall for the same trick twice, Cosmo jumped back to avoid the dark hair. He had to continue jumping back as Nightfall unrelentingly punctured the ground in quick succession.

While he was focused on avoiding her dark tendrils, Nightfall jumped up and attempted the whiplash again. Cosmo saw her coming and lifted his sword to block her. When the hooks and sword met, Nightfall lashed her hair beneath them and tripped Cosmo. As he fell back, Nightfall kicked at his right hand and the glowing sword was flung away. Before Cosmo could react, she landed one foot on his chest and pressed an illuminated hook to his throat.

Slowly, so that she wouldn't slice his neck open, Cosmo raised his hands in defeat.

The lights flashed on so that the spectators could get a full view of the fighters. Nightshade, now standing, observed the scene curiously. Then he shrugged. "Finish him."

Cosmo's head shot toward his uncle, the claws at his throat completely forgotten. A mix of emotions swam across his eyes: first utter shock, then horror, and finally terror. He fearfully returned his gaze to the Skylander.

Nightfall, on the other hand, looked up at Nightshade in disgust. "Get up," she snarled at Cosmo. Obediently, he stumbled to his feet.

Nightshade didn't seem bothered by Nightfall's direct disobedience. He shrugged carelessly and returned his attention to the audience. "Well folks, that concludes tonigh-"

"Wait, wait, wait!" Moneybone interrupted. "Isn't the battle to the death?" He waved his hand at the two combatants. "I expected a bloody ending," he fussed.

"The S.U.R.G.E. law states that the victor of a death battle has the right to spare or deny his or her opponent's life as long as that opponent has surrendered in defeat," Nightshade said flatly. "Nightfall has chosen to spare Cosmo's life. No one is allowed to interfere with her decision."

"What!?" Moneybone cried, aghast. "That's a ridiculous law!"

"Maybe," was all Nightshade said.

"Well, you're in charge of this place, aren't you?" Count Moneybone pressed. "Can't you override or something?"

"No I cannot." Nightshade managed to keep his annoyance in check. "If I desire to maintain my role as lord of the Frozen Fire Arena, I have to uphold the ancient laws," he said firmly, making it clear that the discussion was over. "Now, you are all dismissed for the night."

* * *

The metal doors slammed shut once again, locking the Skylanders in the dimly lit chamber.

"Let me look at it," Astroblast offered to Nightfall. Her gash was still oozing blood and a bit of pus. Fortunately, the guards had once again left them proper healing supplies.

"I can handle it," Nightfall said. She sat down heavily on her cot. She'd managed to maintain a regal actualization throughout being escorted to the cells, but now she let her cozen act drop and her exhaustion take hold.

"You sure?" Astroblast persisted. "It looks pretty deep."

"I can do it myself," she insisted, firmly but not unkindly. To prove her point, she began to rummage through the medical pack the Spell Punks had given her. Although she enjoyed being part of a team, Nightfall was still used to having to do things herself. "By the way, I think Splat's paint has finally worn off," she said in an attempt to change the subject.

"Oh," he said, a little surprised. "Really?" He'd totally forgotten about his bright orange makeover.

"Hey, she's right!" Pop Fizz exclaimed. He examined the fur on his arm, now back to its deep blue.

A hiss of pain caused Astroblast to look back at Nightfall. She had her eyes screwed shut in pain as she held a rag to her wound. He could see her hand was shaking as she attempted to press it on the gash.

"Um, okay. Nightfall, lie down," he said. "I let you help me yesterday, now let me help you."

She sighed in defeat and did as he asked. "So is anyone going to tell me why Splat is holding a toddler?" she asked in another attempt to draw the attention away from her.

The fox kit had fallen asleep during the battle. Splat was still cradling him in her arms as she sat on the edge on her cot. As she held him, Pop applied the band-aid that had been provided for the kit.

High Volt briefly explained his fight against Nightshade's minions and the kit. As he finished his summary, the kit yawned and began to rub his eyes. He blinked, examining his surroundings with tired eyes. All of the sudden, he gave cry of fear and tried to bury himself in Splat's arms.

"What's wrong?" Splat asked, startled. The rest of the Skylanders were also attentive, due to the sudden outburst.

"Big eye!" he said in a trembling voice. The kit pointed an accusing finger directly at Dive Clops, who was in the next cage over. The tension in the chamber relaxed.

Gill Grunt began to chuckle. "I think the little tyke thinks that you might be a cyclops," he said highly amused.

Dive Clops was not so amused. "I'm not one of those cyclops," he tried to reason with the kit.

It didn't help. The kit was breathing heavily, on the verge of tears. He clung to Splat's arm as if his life depended on it.

"I don't mean to be rude," Jet Vac interjected, "but Splat, can you please _calm him down?"_

"I'm trying!" she said irritably.

Dive Clops got an idea. He pulled his loosely swinging eye-guard out of the way and rolled himself onto the ground, free of his diving suit.

The kit went silent. Then his whole face lit up. "Ball!" he cried joyfully. He slid off Splat's lap and squeezed through the bars, effortlessly making it to the other cell. "Ball!" he said again, and began walking clumsily towards Dive Cops.

"Uh, no..." Dive Clops rolled backwards wearily. Fuzzy fingers in the eye don't feel very good. Actually, _anything_ in the eye doesn't feel very good. The kit didn't hinder his approach, so Dive made a break for his dive suit. The kit gave chase, but didn't catch up in time. Instinctively, Dive slammed the guard back over his eye, only for it to swing back open on bent hinges. The kit still reached up for him, so he backed away quickly.

"Aww, you have a new admirer," Roller Brawl teased.

Thinking quickly Dive pointed across the room. "Hey! Remember him?"

The kit stooped and looked at where he was pointing. He smiled in delight as he recognized High Volt, and began to make his way over.

"No, no!" High Volt said slightly panicked. "Go that way!" he tried to shoo the kit in the opposite direction.

"I thought you liked kids," Stormblade said, slightly surprised.

" _I_ don't mind them, but do you really think it's a good idea to leave a toddler in the same confined space as Trigger Happy?" Said gremlin was currently doing push-ups using his tongue while still managing the occasional giggle.

"Oh," Dive Clops said, realizing his mistake.

The kit was looking between all the different Skylanders in confusion. Why was the metal one upset? Where was he supposed to go now? Why were there so many unfamiliar faces? When was snack time?

Roller Brawl knelt down by the corner of her cell, wincing as she did so. "Come'er kid," she beckoned the kit. Having run out of other options, he did so eagerly. Roller Brawl let him crawl into her lap. "Can you tell me your name?" she asked while letting him grab onto her gloved hand.

"Ty!" he said cheerfully.

"Ty?"

"Ty," he repeated.

"Well now that we have that all cleared up," Spitfire said to gain everyone's attention. (Fiesta was now letting Ty play with his large hat.) "Let's move on to some more important topics."

"Such as?" Eruptor inquired.

"Such as who this late guest is and why Nightshade needs him," Jet Vac said. "I mean, it's pretty obvious that Moneybone is Nightshade's source of funding for his army. Moneybone may have taken several poundings, but he's still filthy rich. What else does Nightshade need?"

"I'm still trying to figure out why the heck he even needs an army," Terrafin said in frustration. He knew that he wasn't the sharpest of the bunch, but last he checked, giant armies weren't Nightshade's style. "He's never cared for trying to rule Skylands, or even revenge on us Skylanders. This isn't like him."

"What if he's working for someone?" Stormblade suggested.

Jet Vac shook his head. "He's too proud to do that. He might ally with someone, but only on his terms."

"But what other explanation is there?" Stormblade. "He made it sound like he wasn't in complete control of this place. Like he has to follow some rules in order to keep his position."

"He isn't working for anyone," Spitfire said firmly. "That much I know. As for the stability of his position, I'm going to guess that he is dependent on the community. This place is very old, so it probably has a system that prevents the overlord from complete power."

"You're right about this place being ancient," Splat said. "It's got a very similar feel to the Spell Punk Library."

"How so?" Gill Grunt asked. Death fights and underground prisons versus shelves of books. He wasn't seeing many similarities.

"The magical aura," Splat explained. "It's very similar to the library."

"Huh, you're right," Pop Fizz said. "Musta been too distracted to notice it before. That, or I drank something that messed with my magic sense." He shrugged, not really caring.

"Great, now can we please return to the topic of who this other guest is?" Jet Vac said, a little irritated.

"Could be anybody really," Pop shrugged. "Could be someone we don't even know."

"Not just anybody," High Volt spoke up. "It'll be someone Nightshade can get some use out of. Non-money-related use."

"But what else does he need?" Astroblast asked. "He has an army, he has a giant hidden base, he has a lot of gold, he has eighteen Skylander hostages, and if he finds the vehicles-"

"Let's not dwell on the what-ifs, eh amigo?" Fiesta cut in. The very thought of Nightshade having all the rift engines at his disposal… Not something to think about right now.

Spitfire sighed. "I don't think we'll be getting any more answers tonigh-"

"Transportation!" Thrillipede said suddenly. "Nightshade doesn't have any form of transportation. Not that we've seen anyway." He was rather pleased with his observation. "If Nightshade plans to use that army of his, he'll need a solid form of transportation. I should know."

"That could be it," Spitfire said. "But like I was saying, we aren't going to get any confirmed answers tonight. Now," he clasped his hands together, "does anybody have any sort of vague idea of an escape plan? I think we will be needing one."

"Hungry!" Ty suddenly said with displeasure.

 _Oh boy…_

* * *

" _What_ was _that_!?" Cosmo slammed the door to Nightshade's office shut. He was seething with rage.

"I knew she wouldn't kill you." Nightshade didn't bother to look away from the file he was studying. This was definitely his least favorite part of being a tyrant. The coads he had to keep up with, the numbers of supplies and what-not. It was why he preferred to stick to thievery, but alas, a villain's got to what a villain's got to do.

"And how would you know that?!" Cosmo's expression changed as he realized something. "Did you set me up to fail?!" He clenged his fists in anger. All he had asked for was a chance to prove he was ready to fight against skylanders. A _fair_ chance.

Nightshade sighed in annoyance and dropped the file to address his nephew properly. "Why would I waste my time trying to set you up for failure? I'd rather you succeed because then you could actually be useful. Besides, you can't pick the skylander who confronts you. You lost not because I gave you an impossible situation, but because you aren't ready to face real skylanders."

Cosmo tried to speak, but Nightshade cut him off.

"I'm not saying you can't fight at all, but the minions you have faced here are nothing compared to Eon's skylanders. You were thwarted by just one in a controlled environment. In the real world, they travel in packs. You aren't ready. Maybe eventually you'll figure it out," Nightshade shrugged.

"But how could you know Nightfall wouldn't kill me?" Cosmo growled. He wasn't about to let the situation dropp.

Nightshade rolled his eyes, "Because she's a _skylander_. An aggressive one, given, but still a skylander. And skylanders never kill unless they have to." He smirked at Cosmo's silent rage. "I'm more in control than you realize."

"Really? Because it sure doesn't look like it!" Cosmo snapped. "You _know_ what they have down there, don't you?! And keeping them in the same chamber?! You're practically begging for a revolt!"

The atmosphere dropped a few degrees as Nightshade became very serious. He fixed Cosmo in a steely glare. "I am _very_ aware of what is down there, nephew. But the skylanders don't know anything about it. As long as they remain clueless, it'll be safe. And as for leaving them where they can communicate," Nightshade relaxed a little," let's just say I have a plan. A good one."

Cosmo still didn't agree with his uncles decisions, but remained silent. He'd already pushed his luck challenging him like that.

Nightshade tossed his stack of papers aside. "We better get going, nephew. She has arrived."

* * *

 **Well, it wasn't quite ASAP, but still, better than last time. ;)**

 **Anywho, next chapter: Ring Around the Road**


	9. Chapter 9, Ring Around the Road

**Yes, I know this is way overdue. But like I said, I will not abandon this story. I really don't want to. Ever heard of this thing called real life? Crazy I know, but I do have a real life, and I put it ahead of my virtual life. That, and a ran into a lot of writers block on several parts of this chapter. This was one that I knew was necessary, but didn't plan it out very well. Fortunately, the next three chapters are very well planed out, so they will (hopefully) come out in a much quicker succession.**

 **Anywho, enjoy the chapter! It's a long one, so that should compensate for the wait. At least a little bit. (I really am sorry this took so long)**

* * *

The next morning, or what was assumed to be the next morning came. (They still didn't have a way to track time.) While last night had failed to bring any new ideas for an escape plan, the morning had brought some new hope; Elf was awake.

It was Jet Vac who first noticed. "Elfy! You're awake!" That got everyone's attention pretty quick.

"Yeah, but I've got a splitting headache." She rubbed at the back of her head. "I would have regenerated sooner, but there are hardly any life sources down here for me to draw on."

"There has been a lot death in this place," Fiesta affirmed solemly. " Let us fill you in…"

"… But to be honest, right now we're just happy you're alright." Thrillipede wrapped Elf in a three armed embrace. "We were worried you'd gone into a coma."

"You know," Stealth Elf said thoughtfully, "that might not be such a bad idea."

"Um, what?"

"Not literally," Ely reassured him. "What I mean is it wouldn't be a bad idea to make them think I am in a coma." In a puff of green mist, Stealth Elf vanished from her cell and reappeared outside of it. "I woke up yesterday when no one was around," she explained, "and discovered that ol'Nightshade left a few cracks in his security system. Unfortunately, I was too dizzy to explore then, but once all of you are sent back to the arena-"

"You can search for an escape route," Spitfire finished for her. The elf nodded (which wasn't the best move) in confirmation. "Guys, I think we've got our escape ticket."

"Wait, where'd you get a ticket?" Smash Hit asked.

* * *

Just like the previous day, specific Skylanders were singled out ahead of the rest. This time it was Astroblast, Fiesta, Gill Grunt, and Spitfire who were taken to be prepared for battle. Also like the previous day, the rest of the Skylanders were led to the same cages to watch what happened. The guards didn't give Stealth Elf a second glance as the let Thrillipede out of the cell. She remained as still and impassive as she had when she was actually unconscious.

Splat had tried to carry the sleeping Ty out with them, but the guards stopped her.

"He can stay here," one of the guards said gruffly.

"You want to leave a toddler here all alone?" Splat protested. "Not a good idea."

"He won't be alone," the guard said, and pointed to Elf.

"She doesn't count."

The guard shrugged, not really caring if the kit had an eligible supervisor or not. There wasn't anything she could do, so Splat had to leave the kit with Stealth Elf. She knew that elf was perfectly capable of handling him, but it would most definitely slow her down.

There were already some scuffles going on in the ring, but the audience was only half interested. Most were chatting among themselves or off getting a snack from concessions. Nightshade was on his throne as usual, but he wasn't paying any attention to the ring at all. He was bent over and talking in a hushed and serious voice so that no one would hear him. He spoke to the Witch Pitcher who had first escorted the Skylanders to their prison, a Commander drow elf, an elderly greeble, and his nephew, Cosmo. Count Moneybone and whoever the new guest was were currently absent. Nightshade glanced over to the cells where the Skylanders were at, than gave some command to the ensemble in front of him. The Drow and Greeble bowed then hurried out a door behind the podium. Nightshade used his wooden staff to righten himself, while the Witch Pitcher and Cosmo stepped to the back of the podium and stood waiting.

Thrillipede watched the podium carefully. From what he could tell, Cosmo served as a disciplinary commander and an extra pair of eyes for Nightshade. A small amount of power, but not a real threat. He was more interested in the Drow elf, Witch pitcher, and Greeble. From his experience, he'd say that the elf was someone in charge of security and also likely the one who oversees the armada. He could even be the chief commander next to Nightshade, but there was no way to tell for sure. That Pitcher was definitely someone important, and Thrillipede wondered if he had more power over this place than Nightshade. Being the dominant overlord isn't always the most powerful position. He'd be sure to keep an eye on him. The Greeble was another story. Thrillipede had fought in a war against them, but he couldn't figure out why this one would be important. Greebles aren't very bright, so unless the entire army is a greeble revolution, generals generally don't give them power in any way, shape, or form. And even if this one did have the smarts to have authority, he didn't showcase it, which was very unlike a greeble. In fact, he looked just like any other elderly greeble: old, malevolent, and grumpy. Thrillipede's best guess was that he'd been here a long time, possibly a reigning champion at some point before retirement.

A loud, echoing _thud_ rang out across the stadium and silenced most of the crowd, drawing their attention to Nightshade. He struck his staff to the ground again, this time hushing everyone. The fighting in the arena had ended, and the defeated removed to leave it open and ready for use. Nightshade smiled broadly as he stood watching the assembled horde. "Now, I know you are all excited about today's events, but first let us welcome our guests of honor!"

Applause thundered in the stands and various creatures shouted out enthusiastically, most of them having no idea what was going on, but everyone else was doing it. s

From the same door that the Drow elf and Greeble had exited, Moneybone entered. He waved to the crowd as he situated himself to Nightshade's right. The Skylanders, however, weren't watching him. They were straining to see who else was emerging from the shadowed door. Slowly, elegantly, the second figure emerged, revealing herself to be none other than Kaossandra.

* * *

After the doors shut behind her friends, Stealth Elf waited a moment to be sure she was alone. If she got caught, it was game over. She pricked her ears, then quickly remembered one of them was still freshly torn. There were very few places that hampered her life magic this much. She didn't like it. Even the ground was full of life, or at least it was meant to be. It was almost as though some _thing_ had drained all the life from this hollow cavern.

A gentle sneeze made Elf nearly jump out of her skin. She sat up and found the little fox kit, Ty, rubbing his face sleepily. He looked up at her with large, tired eyes.

Elf sighed. "I don't think I can take you along," she said. "It'd be too dangerous. And this mission is too important. " She looked around for something, anything, that could entertain the kit while she was gone. Her options were limited: pillows, blankets, medical supplies, and ice packs.

Medical supplies was an automatic no; there an infinite number of things that could go wrong with that. Melted ice packs, well… Stealth Elf look back at the kit who was currently occupying himself by chewing on a blanket. Nope. That left her with pillows and blankets.

"Alright, Ty," Stealth Elf said to the kit. "See all these blankets?"

He nodded.

"I want you to gather as many of them as you can and build a big fort for me. Do you think you can do that?"

Ty nodded eagerly and stood up. He grabbed the blanket he'd been chewing on and handed it to Elf. "Help," he said.

"No, no," Elf tried to explain as the kit ran over to grab Thrillipede's blanket. "You have to do it on your own and surprise me when I get back."

He responded with a baffled expression. "Big for'?"

"Yes, _you_ build a big fort while _I_ leave for a little while."

The kit looked around the chamber and for the first time realized that no one else was around. "Where Spla'?" he asked in confusion.

'Splat had to go do something." Elf explain patiently.

"Where Fi'?

"Fi? Oh, Fiesta's gone too."

"Where-"

"Do you wanna build that fort now?" she cut in before he could asked where every other Skylander had gone.

"Yeah," he said.

"Okay, you do that and I'll be right back." Before he could ask any more questions, Elf quickly made her escape. She waited outside the door for one beat... two beats… three- crying arose from within the chamber.

"No, no, it's okay," Elf reappeared inside the chamber and tried to comfort the sobbing kid. "Look, I'm back, see?" This wasn't going to work…

* * *

How was this possible? It took incredibly powerful dark magic to lock Kaossandra within the mirror realm, so it would have to take incredibly powerful dark magic to get her out. Kaossandra's own magic was what had locked her within the mirror, and there were very few beings whose power matched her's. Nightshade's power over the dark element was strong, but nowhere close to having the capacity of freeing the dark portal mistress.

This could only mean one of three things; either Nightshade has a very powerful dark relic that he drew power from, he teamed up with several dark magicians, or there was someone, or something, that was just as powerful with the dark arts as Kaossandra hidden in these caverns.

Kaossandra glared down at the caged Skylanders with resentment. She didn't say a word or even glance at the audience as she took her seat next to Nightshade. Although she didn't seem to be particularly thrilled about being here, she maintained a calm demeanor and tranquil expression as she gazed down into the arena.

"Based on what you guys have told me," Stormblade said a little nervously, "this is really, really bad."

Before anyone could answer her, the doors on either side of the arena began to slide open.

* * *

Elf slipped passed the two trolls who were guarding the doors that lead to her friends. She was running way behind schedule. Ty just hadn't been able to stop laughing at the sensation of teleportation. Said kit was now nestled contently in her arms as she made her way through the stone tunnels.

From what Stealth Elf could tell, the maze that they were being imprisoned in was enormous, and they were located near the very front of it. If she were to go deeper in, Stealth Elf was sure she'd find many untold horrors. There was no way she would venture any further than she had to without a map or companion. And there was no way she was taking a kid down there either.

The curved tunnel leading to the arena was currently unoccupied, so Elf hurried down it until she reached the first of the three doors. Based on what High Volt and Nightfall told her, the first two of these doors lead to a chamber where contestants were prepared for the fight. She was partially tempted to pop in to check on her friends and give them some reassurance, but there would undoubtedly be guards and she was already running late as it is. Elf walked passed the first two doors and approached the third. All three doors were spread apart evenly, so everyone had assumed that the third also lead to a chamber like the others. Stealth Elf, however, had a hunch that this one lead to something different. This place had been carefully and elaborately planned out by whomever built it, so there was most likely a direct access path to the labyrinth from headquarters.

"You ready, Ty?" Elf asked the kit.

"Poof!" he agreed.

"Now remember," she said sternly, "We're on a stealth mission, so you have to be _very_ quiet."

Ty put a finger to his lips, mimicking silence.

"Good job," Elf told him. She vanished from the room and reappeared on the other side of the doors. Ty was grinning madly, but didn't make any sounds.

She was right... this wasn't a chamber at all.

* * *

"Today's main event is going to be very different," Nightshade spoke over the rattle of chains. "You see, long ago-"

"- Can you save us the history lecture?"

Nightshade glared at Count Moneybone.

"We all know this place is old and used to be very popular," the skeletal dictator complained. "Let's just get on with the show. I don't see Fiesta down there, so I'm going to assume…"

Nightshade sighed in annoyance. "Bring them in."

From the right gate entered all four of the selected Skylanders while from the left gate entered two Drow elves, a beefy troll, and another one of Krankcase's leftover wooden creations.

"Allow me to introduce today's competitors," Nightshade gave Moneybone a sideways glare, daring him to interrupt again. "On the Skylander team, we have the ever famous fire demon, champion racer, and leader of the Skylanders Superchargers team, Spitfire! He is accompanied with the underworld's most famous mariachi band musician, Fiesta, an alien from an unknown world, Astroblast, and one of Skyland's oldest veteran fish, Gill Grunt." Nightshade paused to allow the audience to jeer at them. "And as for the Frozen Fire team, they are lead by Skyland's dirtiest troll racer and professional cheat, Doom Boom!"

Spitfire snickered. "Is 'Doom Boom' really the best name you could come up with?" The troll glared back at him. "I mean, I've heard some pretty terrible names, but this has got to be one of the lamest."

"Señor Spitfire," Fiesta warned, "es not the time to be making enemies. Ellos no pareces ser fuertes, but es malo to hacer judgement before tú sabes."

"On the contrary," the female Drow Elf said, "this is the perfect time to make enemies. That's why we're here after all."

"Making enemies can wait a few moments," Nightshade said. "As I was saying, Doom Boom is accompanied by the unstoppable pair of drow twins, Thunderclash and Shadow Lily, and a misshapen beast made of wood and goo, Split Trick. Now you may have a moment to get acquainted before you try to kill each other."

"You Skylanders are going down," the brother Drow Elf, Thunderclash, declared. "Get ready to witness the rise of a new champion!"

"Champions," Shadow Lily corrected, glaring at her twin.

"Yeah sure, sis."

The twin elves were noticeably related. Both were tall with slim frames and had almost identical facial features. The girl had her dark blue hair tied into a high ponytail while the boy had his cut short. They both wore metal armbands with razor blades that rose toward the elbow.

"What makes you think you've got what it takes to beat me?" Astroblast countered. "Last I checked, you two weren't famous."

"Astroblast…," Fiesta said warningly.

"Shut it skeleton," Shadow Lily snapped.

"Looks like you ought to learn a little respect miss," Spitfire stepped in. "You don't wanna pick a fight you can't win."

She flattened her ears and was about retort when Doom Boom, stopped her. "No, no, he's right," the troll said. "There's no reason to be rude. After all, it's not like they have much longer to live!" he cackled at his own remark. Doom Boom was like any other troll: short, hairy, ugly, and horrible at witty comebacks.

"Was that supposed to be intimidating?" Spitfire drew closer to the troll. "I've heard mabu make better threats," He said… or at least tried to say. Spitfire's hand shot to his throat. He'd spoken the words, but no sound had come out. "What the-" Now, his voice was working again. "What the heck just happened?"

"Ah, yes," Nightshade said. "I forgot to mention, the arena has a little trick. See while in the ring it is impossible for anyone to lie. Doesn't matter who you are, no intentional lies can be spoken. However, if what you say isn't true, but you don't know it's not true, you can still say it. Gets a little tricky sometimes, but who am I to judge. Now, as much as I love to watch you all play top dog, we've got a show to put on."

* * *

Elf stared in shock at the road stretched before her. It wasn't a modern road; it looked as if it was meant for chariots. Whatever it was originally meant for, there was no doubting that it was a race track. The track and tunnel surrounding it curved to left until she couldn't see where it led. Wait, if she was in the middle of a track then… Stealth Elf turned around. Instead of finding a wall or door, there was nothing. Nothing stood between her and the tunnel she'd just come from. She put one hand forward to feel the area where the wall should have been, but there was nothing.

"Odd," she said to herself.

"Shhh!" Ty scolded. He put a finger to his lips again.

"Sorry," she whispered with a half smile. Leave it to a toddler to call her out. Stealth Elf set him down. "Ty, I need you to stay right here for a moment. I'll be right back, I promise." He nodded and sat down.

Elf turned back to the opening and walked back into the other tunnel, stopping by the opposite wall. She put her hand to it and found that it was solid and firm. The stone was cool and damp; it was really there. But that didn't make any sense. The tunnel leading to the maze was barely wide enough for one person. Why would the road just end? Stealth Elf turned around and discovered that the wall had reappeared, blocking her view from the track and Ty. This she had suspected though. Again, Elf approached the closed door. She reached out and touched it. Solid wood. She felt the walls as well to be sure, then teleported back inside.

Ty was giving her a funny look.

"Were you able to see me the whole time?" Stealth Elf asked him quietly. He nodded. A one-way passage. Anyone on this side could pass through or see what was going on on the other side. It probably effected sound too, but there wasn't time to test it.

Elf looked down the large tunnel. "I wonder what else this place is hiding." The sound of stone scraping against stone made her snap her head around. The section of wall that blocked the road was being lifted up somehow. Light began to pour into the shadowy passageway as the wall retracted. Stealth Elf scooped Ty up as fast as she could. "We have to get out of here," she said and started to run down the tunnel.

* * *

Eight vehicles were dragged into the ring, but not just any eight vehicles…

"Oh great mother of pearl," Gill Grunt mumbled. "You jinxed it Astro."

All eight of the Supercharged land vehicles were pulled in front of the two assembled teams.

"You didn't really think that I'd forgotten about your little toys, did you?" Nightshade asked.

"Sé, we had esperar," Fiesta admitted. "But I guess it was inevitable. Though, I wouldn't call them pequenos juguetes."

"Speak English, will you," Nightshade said.

"No."

Rolling his eyes, Nightshade continued, "I will admit that it did take awhile to find them. Especially with all your Trap Master friends roaming around up there. However, as you can see we did succeed. And yes, we found all of them. So today, we get to do something that hasn't been in very long time."

Spitfire exchanged a glance with Gill Grunt. The Trap Team was due to arrive on the island almost two days ago. It would not bode well for them if the Trap Masters hadn't found a way in. Or if they got caught and were being held captive somewhere else in the labyrinth. Unfortunately, there wasn't any time to fully ponder this as Nightshade carried on.

"As I tried to explain earlier, long ago this arena hosted not only battle brawls, but chariot races as well. Of course, nobody uses those rickety ol' things anymore, but the race track works just as fine for cars as it does for chariots."

On cue, the walls of the arena began to shift, revealing two hidden passageways. One was located directly underneath Nightshade, while the other was in between the right gate and prisoner stands. The one that was beneath Nightshade had a red and black starting/finish line. Four large flat-screen TVs were lowered from the ceiling and hovered above the audience's heads. The screens flicked on to show the starting line from inside the tunnel.

"Now, because these lovely vehicle did belong to the Skylanders until I stole them, I suppose we might as well let them have first pick. Forgive me for not knowing the names of these things, but I'm pretty sure the one with blue wheels and the one with the coffin are going to be two of them."

Some trolls obediently dragged the selected vehicles into place behind the starting line.

"You ought to tell me which ones you prefer," Nightshade said to Gill Grunt and Astroblast. "None of these ones match you, so I'll assume yours are either water or sky. Despite the magnificence of Frozen Fire, we don't have a water track or large enough tunnels for a sky track. I'll definately look into it for the future though," he concluded as if it were something for the Skylanders to look forward to.

Without saying anything, Gill Grunt climbed into the seat of the Gold Rusher and drove it into position. Astroblast followed the senior Supercharger's lead and claimed the Thump Truck while Spitfire and Fiesta got into their respective vehicles.

As soon as the Skylanders had settled, the drow elves sured forward to claim a vehicle for themselves.

"Don't you two even _think_ about it," Doom Boom snarled and shoved them back. "I get first dibs." The twins glowered, but stood back and allowed him to mount the Burn Cycle. As soon as he did so, Thunderclash rushed ahead of his sister and jumped into the Shark Tank. She scowled at him for pushing her aside, but didn't complain as she didn't want that pile of dirt anyway. The motorcycle had been her first choice, but she contented herself with the skeletal car.

Only when his teammates had settled into their rides did Split Trick rouse himself and crawl into the Shield Striker. He remained completely impassive while they waited for the race to begin.

"Lets see what you're really made of, _demon_ ," Doom Boom said under his breath so that the others wouldn't overhear.

"I'd say the same to you," Spitfire shrugged, "but I already know." He started up the Hot Streak's engine, not giving the troll so much as a glance.

Before the troll could retaliate, a small critter with a checkered flag fluttered above the starting line. A foghorn was blown and the flag dropped

* * *

Stealth Elf peered over the rafter and looked down at the guards below. She used one hand to keep balance while the other was clamped over Ty's mouth. They were both drow elves, but not the usual idiots considering that they were silent and alert. But the guards weren't what caught Elf's attention; it was what they were guarding.

It was a mirror, or at least what should have been a mirror. The rim was pure gold set with purple crystal shards, petrified darkness if she had to guess, and tiny black stones that she didn't recognize. Where the glass should have been, or maybe it was within the glass, there was some sort of swirling, violet vortex. Electrical charges of dark energy flickered between the crystals and into the face of the vortex spontaneously.

 _'It looks like some sort of portal; a gateway,'_ she thought to herself. Something clicked if Stealth Elf's mind. Portals, the special guest, gateways, mirrors, transportation… ' _Kaossandra is the special guest, but they probably know about that by now. Why though? Transportation, Thrill mentioned needing transportation, but giant surprise armies is Kaos's thing, not Nightshade's. He need's Kaossandra to link dark portals, to transport, to travel, trade… Trade. That is something Nightshade would do. Stealing things is only worthwhile if someone can trade with you, of course! Wait, but Nightshade's been on the black market without her for a very long time, why does he need her now? Come on, think Elf! He needs Kaossandra to power portals, he need's portals to create links, links, links to where? Links between portals create a network of... A network! They said he mentioned a network of some kind, a thousand year old network, a network of battle arenas. He's rebuilding, reconnecting this network, S.U.R.G.E. is what he called it. But what does that stand for? No, no, focus Elf, focus. That's not important right now. Okay, the mirror, the mirror, why keep the mirror? If Kaossandra's been freed than- If Kaossandra were free she'd be out of here in a heartbeat. She's here, but not free. Nightshade's smart, he's keeping a leash on her. As for the mirror, he's guarding it, so if the mirror breaks one of two things happen: Kaossandra is actually freed or she returns to the mirror realm. Hopefully the second one._ ' Stealth Elf slowly let out a breath. Wow, her head hurts. She needed to find that portal. And find a way out. ' _Let's start with the portal_ ,' she decided.

* * *

Spitfire was in the lead, to no one's surprise, but Doom Boom was right behind. The tunnel was too narrow for anyone to pass at the moment, but there was fork visible up ahead.

"Eat my flames!" Spitfire called over his shoulder. Leaning forward, he thrust the Hot Streak into high gear and surged ahead, leaving a plume of smoke behind.

Doom Boom coughed and waved the the smoke out of his face. He began to fiddle with the Shark Tank's controls until a missile shot forth and landed at the heels of the Hot Streak. The troll began to smile. "You aren't losing me that easily demon."

Astroblast wasn't far behind the troll with both twin elves following close on his tail. Gill Grunt left some distance between himself and the elves, but not too much because Split Trick didn't leave him much room. Fiesta trailed way behind the rest of the racers, but no one noticed or cared.

Doom Boom had managed to close some of the distance between him Spitfire, but the fork was coming up fast and he needed to be close enough to pass once the road widened. Nightshade had described the road to him and his team, so Doom Boom knew that the fork was referred to as the cobra's cape. The center path remained strait, while the other two went up and around like the hood of a cobra. It didn't matter which path you took, as there were boosts along the left and right path to make up the difference. Once the three trails rejoined, the path would widen out.

Spitfire chose the center path, and Doom Boom followed his lead. The troll looked over the controls in hope of finding something that might give him a boost. "Let's see what this does," he said to himself and pressed the button next to the missile launcher. The good news was that the Shark Tank surged forward. The bad news was that it also went _downward_. Doom Boom gagged on a mouthful of dirt, and released the button. The tank returned to the surface and began to swerve a little as the troll clawed at the dirt in his eyes.

Spitfire took advantage of the situation and whipped the Hot Streak into a loop, blasting a trail of fire from the ceiling. Doom Boom looked up just in time to see the fiery wall, and swerve. He managed to avoid the fire at the cost of slamming into the wall.

"Well that took a _dirty_ turn," Nightshade's voice came over the intercom. "Well played, Skylander. Villains, do step up your game please. I don't mean to be rude, but we are counting on you to win. And, Fiesta, do remember that this is a race. I know for a fact you can go faster than that."

"Step up our game? Sure thing," Shadow Lily said. "You ready Thunder?"

"Game on, little sis!"

"For the last time, I'm not your little sister! We're twins!" She sped into the right tunnel.

"You're smaller than me, aren't you?" Thunderclash called after her as he took the left tunnel.

* * *

Stealth Elf felt like she she was standing at the edge of a giant fishbowl. A lake stretched out before her in a perfect circle. The water was so clear that she could see through to the bottom of it, which was a perfect sphere. Colorful light reflected off ripples and danced on the ceiling, giving of a magical effect. Ancient runes were etched everywhere, from under the lake to the top of the cavern. They pulsed at seemingly random intervals and with all different colors, filling the place with even more mystic light.

"Well, we found the portal, Ty," Stealth Elf said. Floating in the center of the lake was a tiny island with a portal rooted on it. Water bubbled from the edges of the portal and into the lake. "And we also found their unnatural water source. Yippy."

Ty clapped enthusiastically, completely missing her sarcasm. He wasn't entirely sure what a portal was, or why they were in this place, but the elf said that they'd succeed.

Stealth Elf smiled at the kit in amusement, than returned her attention to the floating portal. "I have no idea how to get over there, let alone destroy it," she thought outloud. "This place is shielded with powerful magic, so it's no wonder that Nightfall didn't find it."

A loud splash snapped her attention back to the kit. "Ty, no!" she cried. The kit had jumped off the platform and splashed into the water. Stealth Elf scooped him up and hugged him close, all her senses on high alert. When nothing happened, she released a shaky breath. "Ty, do not touch anything without asking first," she said sternly. "This water is way too deep for you to play in, for one thing, and it's never safe to touch mysterious magic water."

Ty nodded quietly. The elf had scared him when she shouted, and now he was even more scared because she seemed to be scared as well.

"Come on," Stealth Elf said in a gentler voice. "Let's go somewhere safer."

* * *

Astroblast had to pick up speed and ride on the side of the tunnel in order to avoid colliding into the Shark Tank. He'd watched the stupid troll quite literally drive it into the ground, and it was hilarious. Said troll was now angrily trying to right himself as Astroblast zoomed past.

Aside from the flames Spitfire had left behind, this smaller tunnel was all but pitch black. A tiny white dot was all that indicated the tunnel's end. Astroblast cranked down on the gas. He couldn't care less if Spitfire won, but he didn't want to let some crook to catch up. If he managed to stay in second, he could keep the rest of these guys off Spitfire's tail.

The tunnel's maw gaped wider and wider as he sped through the tunnel. He could now see that it opened onto a wider road and curved to the right. He readied himself for the approaching curve.

Astroblast shot out of the tunnel, but as he did so two other vehicles slammed into his flanks, stopping all three of them in the middle of the road.

"Huh, that played out way differently in my head," Thunderclash said.

"Um, ya _think_!?" His sister glared at him. "We agreed that you'd fall back enough so we could trap him between us, remember!?"

"Well, in all fairness, Lily, he is in between us," Thunderclash pointed out.

"Knock it off you two!" Doom Boom had apparently regained control of his vehicle. "We have a race to win!" He sped past the trio.

"We _would_ be winning if it wasn't this dimwit!" Shadow Lily shouted back. "Once the race is over, I'm going to-"

Thunderclash laid back on the Burn Cycle, completely ignoring his sister's rant. "It'll be a while until she stops," He said to Astroblast.

"Does this happen a lot?"

"Eh, one or twice a week usually."

"Are you even listening to me!?"

"Nope."

"If I weren't stuck in this dumb car-"

"Yeah, it's going to be a while."

"I. Am. Going. To. Kill. You."

"Really? I thought you going to do that last week?"

"Hey, you alright Astro?" Gill Grunt slowed down a little to check on his friend.

"Go, go, I'm fine," Astroblast waved him on. "I'll just stay here and make sure no one kills each other."

Gill Grunt nodded and sped back up. Split Trick passed right after without diving them a second glance. It was a couple of seconds before Fiesta came out of the tunnel.

"Dude, what are you doing?" Astroblast asked. "Nightshade's right, you can go a lot faster than that."

"Looking at the bigger picture," was all that Fiesta said as he went past.

* * *

There was one more place she needed to find before the escape route. She needed to know where the vehicles were being stored. Whatever happened, they had to escape with the Supercharged vehicles.

On her way back up from the weird portal lake, Stealth Elf had caught a glimpse of the race, which only confirmed her suspicions that Nightshade had found the vehicles. It wasn't really a surprise. They had hidden them with the intent of returning soon, not being captured by a giant underground army.

Stealth Elf was both assuming and hoping that the garage would be near the surface of the island. It'd make sense.

She turned at a bend, then ducked around the corner to avoid being spotted by a couple of drow. Once their voices died away, Stealth Elf slipped down the hall. Ty gripped her hand tightly, still a little rattled from his swim. The gravity of the situation had started to dawn on him, and he didn't like it. Not at all.

* * *

Fiesta didn't let himself fall too far behind in case another one of his friends got stuck, but winning was the last thing he was worried about right now. Like he'd told Astroblast, he was looking at the bigger picture. From what he had gathered so far, this track was pretty big, covering about a fourth of the goliath island. Several openings on the sides of the road indicated that it cut straight through the labyrinth. They must be near the end of the first lap by now, considering that it had been a while since they passed Astroblast.

One of the blue ghouls grabbed onto Fiesta's shoulder tightly. Ahead of them, the Shield Striker suddenly whipped around and began to drive in reverse. The hatch opened and Split Trick climbed onto the front of the car. His wooden jaw dropped down to reveal a jagged grin of razor teeth. He stretched out his arms and they each split into two, creating four arms total. Long talons slid onto what had previously been blunt fingers. He hunched over, using his new arms for balance, and his back split apart like the shell of a beetle. A machine gun flipped forward and began shooting at the ground in front of the Crypt Crusher while a grappling hook latched onto the Shield Striker's steering wheel.

Fiesta had to swerve left and right to avoid getting hit. Dust filled the air, and his bandmates had to grab on tightly so the wouldn't be flung off. It became increasingly difficult to see through the cloud of sand, and suddenly Split Trick was right in front of them.

Four taloned hands grabbed the nose of the Crypt Crusher, holding it fast. Split Trick's crooked grin widened even further, and they both lurched forward as the Shield Striker was thrust into full throttle.

"I think I found the trick!" Fiesta shouted in hope of warning the others. He suddenly became very aware that they were now racing on the edge of a chasm. "Bien no," Fiesta gulped.

Twelve claws dug even deeper into the hood. Split Trick yanked the wheel to the left, and then the entire front half of the Shield Striker and all of the Crypt Crusher was hovering above the chasm. A split second later, Fiesta felt a hard collision that nearly knocked him out.

"What the-"Gill Grunt shook his head. "Um, is it just me, or did Split Trick just turn into a wooden devil?"

Fiesta laughed. Not a happy laugh, just a 'glad to be alive right now' laugh. He and his amigos were trembling. "I thought he was going to throw us off the cliff," he gasped. "We were so going to die." He laid back as the sudden adrenaline rush wore off. "I did not see any of that coming."

* * *

"We did it Ty!" Stealth Elf said in an excited whisper. "We found them!" Before the fox and elf was an enormous garage. It was filled with all sorts of vehicles, including the van that carried them here and all the sea and sky vehicles. What was even better, though, was that one of the giant doors that lead out of the garage lead upward. Small beams of sunlight fell through the cracks. "And our way out," she said even quieter, mostly to herself.

"There they are!"

Stealth Elf only had time to move Ty out of the way before a net was shot over her. Several Drow swarmed her, pinning her to the ground. ' _How did they know to look for me? No one saw us.'_ It was possible that they'd set off some sort of silent alarm… Ty started crying, and Elf silently prayed that they hadn't hurt him.

"We've got her," one of the drow said into a mic. "Turns out your source was right, she is awake and has decided to explore."

…... That didn't sound like an alarm.

* * *

"What are you doing!?" Doom Boom cried. "Don't you remember the plan? _I_ am supposed to win. _You_ are the _backup_!"

"That was your plan, not Nightshade's." Split Trick had transformed his machine gun into a jet pack giving him the ability to surge ahead of all the other vehicles.

"Wait, what? Nightshade's plan? Since when was there a Nightshade's plan!?" Doom Boom called after the wooden golem, but there was no reply. "Ugg!" He kicked the Shark Tank in frustration. That hurt, a lot, which made him even more mad. "I need to blow something up!" he shouted, and left the track boiling with rage.

Split Trick was closing the gap between him and the Hot Steak. Spitfire looked over his shoulder worriedly. He left yet another trail of flame behind him, but again Split Trick avoided it with ease. Four clawed hands reached for Hot Streak.

"STOP THE RACE!" Nightshade cried. Both Spitfire and Split Trick skidded to a halt. "There appears to be a minor issue with our security. I'm afraid all racers must return to the arena immediately." There was a collective awwing and booing over the intercom. "Yes I am quite disappointed myself. I really was looking forward to seeing how this would play out. Some other day, perhaps."

Spitfire looked uncertainly at the wooden devil that had been seconds away from killing him. To his surprise, Split Trick was retracting his claws and jetpack with jerking movements. His back slid closed, arms reconnected, and his jaw, or what passed as a jaw, slid back over his jagged teeth. Finally the red glow of his eyes returned to a docile green. Spitfire hadn't even notice the eye color difference before.

"Is that it?" Spitfire asked uncertainly.

Split Trick shrugged impassively and started up the Shield Striker's engine again.

"You are really creepy, you know that, right."

Again Split Trick shrugged. "I was made by Dr. Krankcase."

* * *

The vehicles had been taken away, the track closed off, and the bad guy team dismissed. Seventeen Skylanders now filled the arena, much like their first night. The were each accompanied by two guards since they weren't shackled this time.

"Let's cut to the chase, shall we?" Nightshade jumped down from the dias and into the ring. Three guards entered as well. Two of them tossed Stealth Elf in front of Nightshade, while the third set down a whimpering Ty.

"Roaming around my private property," Nightshade tisked. "Quite rude really, after all my hospitality."

Stealth Elf flattened her ears, not amused.

"I will admit that your plan was rather clever, and might have worked if I didn't know that you'd woken up."

There was a sharp breath drawn by some of the Skylanders.

"Aw, yes. You are all probably wondering how I knew. The answer's simple; there is a traitor in your midst."

* * *

 **The next chapter will be: Tracing the Traitor**


	10. Authors Note (Good news, not bad)

**Dear Faithful Viewers,**

 **I know I've been keeping you all on edge for quite some time, and a lot of you have probably lost hope by now. Honestly, I can't blame you. But you'll be happy to here that I wasn't sitting down and twiddling my thumbs this whole time, nor was I shifting to a different fan-base. On the contrary, ever since the last chapter was released, I've been working on a very special project. Writing this story drew my attention to some characters I previously didn't care much about. One I happened to grow very fond of, even though I didn't like her at all at first. So I've been working on a rather long short. For the last nine months. Here's the thing, While this story has a lot of volume, action, and humor, it lacks serious real-world depth. Don't get me wrong, I love writing this story and IT IS NOT ABANDONED, but is a lighter thing to write. What I've been working on has been very challenging in different ways and a lot more time consuming. But as a result, I believe it will be my best work yet, twice as good as Street dog. And, as a bonus, I'v also been working on a light one-shot for a friend that is almost complete. The reason I tell you this now is that the biggest hurtle with the story has finally been resolved, allowing me to start to wrap it up. To give you an idea of it's length, t'll be over 10k. I plan to release it, along with the other short, on August 2. If something comes up, Ill notify you and present a new release date. Remember, I will not release anything unless I feel it's truly ready. Once the two shorts are released, I'm going to focus 100% on the next two chapters. I promise this story will be completed, but I feel no inclination to rush. I also refuse to let my Sky-life interfere with my real-life. Once those next to chapters are out, there's another short multiple people have requested about a certain queen and floating head... But I won't stress over that till the time comes. I will be attaching the tho shorts to Street Dog, which will become my collection of shorts. It will be renamed, but Street Dog won't change. So keep an eye out on August 2 for the next two entry's of Skylanders: The Untold Tales.**

 **Till Next Time,**

 **RainStorm**

 **PS: Thank you all for not loosing faith! Especially those who encouraged me in the comments! Also, I did not look this over, so plese forgive stupid mistakes. ;)**


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